Question 4

[Kobold King he/him]

Hordes of outback spiders. Staring down a black bear in its native environment.

 

Why don't I have any awesome Man vs Wild stories?

 

Oh that's right. Because I lived in Illinois for years of my life.

 

I can't speak for the whole of the state, but where I lived in northern Illinois had long since ceased to be wild. While technically a rural region, there were more than enough human habitations littering the once pristine forests there to drive away much of the traditional fauna. Aside from coyotes, foxes, and a few white-tailed deer, very little of the original ecosystem survived the march of human progress. But every once in a blue moon, something wild and savage would find its way back to its traditional homeland...

 

The closest I ever came to one of these encounters was when I was in my early teens. (I wanna say I was fifteen.) The sun had finished setting a few minutes previously, leaving me shuffling about at dusk finishing my farm work. Chickens needed to be closed into their coop; sheep needed to be rounded into their stalls for the night; the cow needed to be scratched behind her ears and told what a good bovine she was. It was a winter day, so I was trudging through thick snow and wearing so much warm clothing it was almost indecent.

 

I had just finished these activities and was heading back to the house, where I was sure a warm meal and electric heating would be available. I was probably seventy yards from the back door when the Australian shepherd bounding at my feet started barking.

 

An Australian shepherd barking is nothing unusual. The Australian shepherd is, I am convinced, a breed of dog which is so traumatized by its origins in Australia that it believes every living thing on this Earth to be a severe and immediate threat to the safety of its well-being. I do not exaggerate when I say this particular dog has been known to bark at butterflies with an intensity that would suggest the zombie apocalypse had just begun. With this information delivered, I hope you'll excuse my fifteen year-old self for chuckling and disregarding the dog's urgent warnings.

 

My dog was eventually joined by the neighbor's terrier, which began yelping and yipping with a fervor that would suggest it was being slowly devoured by some large and powerful predator.

 

It was only later on that I realized this may actually have happened.

 

That's when I heard it. A sound burst through a line of nearby pine trees, freezing me in my tracks and--if you don't mind the cliche--curdling my blood. It was something between a roar and a cry; a shriek which raised every hair on my body. It was the sort of shriek which implies not an animal in distress, but an animal that knows far better than you how to eviscerate and devour a human being.

 

Needless to say, I hurried inside as quickly as I could.

 

A restless perusal of the Internet brought me to a site with recordings of various animal cries. Eventually I hit a sound I instantly recognized--the cry of the mountain lion. The puma. The catamount. The cougar, the Felis concolor.

 

I'd passed within fifty meters of the largest cat in North America. I couldn't shake the certainty that if it had wanted to eat me, I would have made a delicious (if slightly bony) meal for a roaming mountain lion.

 

The next morning I found enormous cat prints scattered through the snow. They were nearly identical to the tracks of housecats--save for the fact that each print was larger than a man's hand.  The big cat had apparently crisscrossed the snow right in front of the barn before slinking away into the trees at the edge of the property.

 

The local game warden was adamant that cougars do not exist in Illinois. "It was a dog," he insisted repeatedly. "Cougars are not present in Illinois." According to the venerable and knowledgeable game warden, the tracks I found were those of a large dog that had merely melted in the snow, seeming larger than they actually were. The cry I heard? He insisted I had misheard a dog barking.

 

I later learned the full politics of the situation--the game department of Illinois is paid an obscene amount of money every year for exterminating deer. The extermination efforts are necessary, they claim, because Illinois has no natural predators large enough to hunt deer. Therefore, humans must fill the role by disposing of hundreds of white-tailed deer every year. They are paid so much money for the job that many of them would be quite nearly ruined by the discovery of a native predator still inhabiting the area. It is apparently their policy to quietly shush and deny any rumors of cougars or other large predators. Apparently my "sighting" wasn't the only one. There are reports of cougars still roaming the forests all over the state. But still, the game wardens deny any such thing.

 

A week later a cougar was found dead a mile from my house, hit by a car and left for dead by the side of the road. The body was quietly collected by the game commission, declared to have "escaped from a circus," and was never seen again.

[Edgedancer he/him]

Kobold that story is really terrifying and makes me very happy that there aren´t any large predators around where I live.

[TwiLyghtSansSparkles she/her]

Dang. Swarmed with spiders, staring down a black bear, confronted with a conspiracy to keep extant cougars under wraps…all of my Man vs. Wild stories are either heartwarming or anticlimactic. 

 

When I was four, I was on a trip to Yellowstone National Park with my parents and little brother. I was picking flowers in a field when a ranger called my name. I don't remember much about that moment—I remember the flowers, blue and yellow, and I remember hearing my name and thinking I had to go. I learned years later that a small group of buffalo was making its way toward me. 

 

When I was eight or nine, I lived in a little town in Wyoming. My house was across the street from a park, and the park bordered land—I don't know if it was BLM or city land or what, but it was basically just miles and miles of weeds and sagebrush. My friends and I liked to hike through those weeds and pretend we were explorers. One day, I was alone—I think my brother was finishing up his schoolwork and my friends were too, so I was waiting for them. I was on the playground, but I got bored, so I decided to go a little ways into the weeds.

 

When I turned around, there was a group of about five whitetail deer, a buck and some does. I remember thinking how tall they were, even though I was a good twenty feet away from them; thinking how if I were right there beside them, the does would've been taller than I was. The buck and most of the does scampered off, but one of the does stayed behind. She stared at me for a long minute, and I'm still certain it was me she was looking at. I remember thinking how beautiful she was, standing there all still, nearly the precise color of the weeds brushing up against her legs, those big dark eyes fixing me in a stare. After a minute, she bounded off into the sagebrush. 

 

Years later, we moved to a town in the middle of the Washington desert. When most people think of Washington state, they think of Seattle—miles and miles of pine trees flanking stretches of rocky beach, with omnipresent storm clouds hovering overhead. That's the far western side of the state. The far eastern side is a bit similar, though there are actually four seasons and a good deal more variety where the trees are concerned—birches, willows, maples, oaks, and a few others I can't name in addition to the pines. I think that when God made Washington, he made the eastern and western sides of the state first, but he put so many trees there that he ran out. So he just left the entire middle stretch of the state bare. The only trees there were planted, and there's not a lot of wildlife. Save for the black widow spider my brother and I found in our backyard when we first moved there. We put it in a jar and told our mother, who was still homeschooling us, that it was a science project. She gave us an A on the condition we release that spider into the wild as far from the house as we could. 

 

Fast-forward to today, when I'm living in Arizona. When God made this state, I don't think he really intended for people to live here. I think Arizona was his abstract period—that point in time where he experimented with the strangest-looking plants and animals he could come up with, and then sat back and watched in horror as people began to flood the borders. I imagine him turning to one of his angels and saying, "I made this place as a joke, but people are moving there! Maybe I'll just let them. They'll get it eventually." Millennia later, Arizona is still flooded with people who swell the population between November and April, and others who live here year round. 

 

It is, without a doubt, the strangest place I've ever lived. You know how on The Princess Bride, there are the ROUSs? We have those. They're called javelina, and they look like wild pigs, but they're actually a type of rodent. Yes, we have rodents the size of pigs, that look and smell like pigs, and will run up to your garbage can at night and tip it over to get at whatever's inside. You'll wake up in the morning to coffee grounds and old napkins strewn all over the street, with everything even mildly edible gone. In the fall, my mom likes to put pumpkins on the front step—they'd last for weeks in Washington, but here, the javelina get to them within the first few days. She'll wake up to find half-eaten pumpkin shells in the yard. 

 

We find all kinds of strange things in our pool filter. We've found scolopendra, dead mice, dead lizards, and even a bright blue caterpillar that looked almost exactly like the one from Alice in Wonderland. Once, a strong wind blew a baby king snake into our pool. Since king snakes eat rattlesnakes, we rescued it with a pool net. Mom wanted to take pictures. She took two while he waited patiently, and on the third, the little snake opened his mouth wide and hissed at her, so she decided it was time to put him out in the wash. 

 

I'm very excited to leave this state. 

[Kobold King he/him]

I live in Texas now, but the largest animal I've seen so far was a dead black bear. (It was apparently hit by a car just outside of Santa Anna.) Earlier this year though a rainstorm washed a rattlesnake out of its den. My cats, being intelligent and totally not idiotic creatures, were trying to catch and eat it. 

 

Arizona sounds like a very strange place. Though I did laugh at your description of it--"God's abstract period" earned a hearty laugh and a mandatory "come read what this person online said" for everyone else in the room with me.

 

The Great Cougar Conspiracy:

 

What I think I do:

 

 

What society thinks I do:

 

 

What the Illinois game commission thinks I do:

 

 

What I really do:

 

[TwiLyghtSansSparkles she/her]

I live in Texas now, but the largest animal I've seen so far was a dead black bear. (It was apparently hit by a car just outside of Santa Anna.) Earlier this year though a rainstorm washed a rattlesnake out of its den. My cats, being intelligent and totally not idiotic creatures, were trying to catch and eat it. 

 

Arizona sounds like a very strange place. Though I did laugh at your description of it--"God's abstract period" earned a hearty laugh and a mandatory "come read what this person online said" for everyone else in the room with me.

 

The Great Cougar Conspiracy:

 

What I think I do:

 

 

What society thinks I do:

 

 

What the Illinois game commission thinks I do:

 

 

What I really do:

 

 

Mighty hunter cats, indeed.   

 

It's bizarre. There was a tarantula in our yard this past summer—about the size of a teacup. Bruno, who usually catches and eats flies and moths, took one look at that tarantula and bolted back into the house, then barked at us until we moved away from the door. Mostly, it's just hot. During the hottest part of the summer, I can't even walk my dogs during the day because the sun bakes the pavement. And then the winters are so mild that they attract all of the elderly from colder climates to drive very very slowly down here. 

 

Though it does have its high points. In the spring, everything blooms. You'll see cacti covered in these bright red and pink flowers, saguaros sprouting white blossoms on all their arms. There are these poisonous toads whose skin secretes this hallucinogenic venom (I call them hypnotoads) and all through monsoon season, you'll hear them croaking between storms. The first time I heard them, I thought they were sheep. And monsoons are something I hope everyone gets to witness at least once. The first year I lived here, I went to the store and arrived just as a monsoon started. The rain poured down like someone had tipped a bucket over the city, and thunder boomed so loud and so close that it set off some poor guy's car alarm. 

 

That game conspiracy, though….that's actually kind of disturbing. Hushing up all evidence of cougars, even when it's clear they present a danger to people and pets? Call me old-fashioned, but I find that unethical to say the least. 

[Kobold King he/him]

T-tarantulas?

 

Nope.

 

I live in west Texas, so I'm prepared that I at some point may run into a tarantula... but I'm still not happy about the prospect. 

 

Snakes don't bother me; bugs don't phase me; I've casually squashed scorpions under my boots. But spiders disturb me on some basic, primal level that I can't quite shake. The argiope spiders of Illinois made me scared of walking through tall grass for years. Here in Texas I've regularly come across a type I call "glintspiders"; I don't know what their real name is, but I named them after the bizarre way their eyes reflect light on moonlit nights. They're the only spiders I know of that actually produce an eyeshine effect. And on hot summer nights when they come out of their holes to hunt... well, let's just say the scrubland becomes as glittery as Funtimes' hair.

 

 

And yeah, the game conspiracy is definitely an unethical piece of bureaucracy. I'm not sure if it's still going on--one website reports that earlier this year Illinois added cougars to the protected species list, so I suppose they must have admitted there are some present at least. But it's an example of how government agencies that try to regulate the environment are particularly prone to corruption.

 

I'm positive there are decent people working for game commissions; I just know that there are others who are woefully self-serving.

[Edgedancer he/him]

Look at the bright side, no matter what wild animals you have meet you won´t ever have to deal with chasemfiends nor with magical mutant Pandas.

Edited November 30, 2014 by Ookla the Edgedancer

[Kobold King he/him]

Look at the bright side, no matter what wild animals you have meet you won´t ever have to deal with chasemfiends nor with magical mutant Pandas.

 

Perspective.

 

Edgedancer has it.

[TwiLyghtSansSparkles she/her]

Look at the bright side, no matter what wild animals you have meet you won´t ever have to deal with chasemfiends nor with magical mutant Pandas.

No matter how many glittering spiders surround you...you will never have to hear Lucentia's opinion on anything at all.

[Kobold King he/him]

No matter how many glittering spiders surround you...you will never have to hear Lucentia's opinion on anything at all.

 

What would Lucentia's opinion of glittering spiders be? 

 

Nathan's one of the few Oregon characters who could legitimately complain about his clashes with animals. "Oh, so you heard a cougar roar once? I'VE SEEN DINOSAURS EATING PEOPLE."

[TwiLyghtSansSparkles she/her]

What would Lucentia's opinion of glittering spiders be?

Nathan's one of the few Oregon characters who could legitimately complain about his clashes with animals. "Oh, so you heard a cougar roar once? I'VE SEEN DINOSAURS EATING PEOPLE."

They'd probably remind her of that glittering abomination's hair and launch her into a rant on how she was a disgrace to Epics.

I have a feeling most of the vanilla characters could shut down most whine fests after all they've seen.

[Edgedancer he/him]

What would Lucentia's opinion of glittering spiders be? 

 

Nathan's one of the few Oregon characters who could legitimately complain about his clashes with animals. "Oh, so you heard a cougar roar once? I'VE SEEN DINOSAURS EATING PEOPLE."

Two things: "What´s the best way to dispose of their corpses." and "Could Mary use some of those?"

 

They'd probably remind her of that glittering abomination's hair and launch her into a rant on how she was a disgrace to Epics.

I have a feeling most of the vanilla characters could shut down most whine fests after all they've seen.

Lucentia has a lot of glittering herself, so she wouldn´t think of Funtimes immediately.

 

Let´s not go into which character has it the worst and agree that it´s definetly not Backtrack.

[Kobold King he/him]

They'd probably remind her of that glittering abomination's hair and launch her into a rant on how she was a disgrace to Epics.

I have a feeling most of the vanilla characters could shut down most whine fests after all they've seen.

 

Lightwards would probably just get ideas from this thread.

 

"Zombie spiders... check. Zombie bear... check. Note to self: don't let anyone stare it down. Zombie mountain lion... check. Zombie game warden... check. Zombie javelina... uh, check. I guess I can send them to root around in CorpseMaker's trash... or... something."

[TwiLyghtSansSparkles she/her]

Let´s not go into which character has it the worst and agree that it´s definetly not Backtrack.

"And--and then I got arrested just for walking through town! They didn't even say what I'd done wrong!"

"Uh-huh. Tell me about the time you got drugged and strapped to a table for doing your job well and never complaining about the psychopath murdering your friends."

"Uh...that never happened to me. But I got arrested!"

Edited November 30, 2014 by TwiLyghtSansSparkles

[Edgedancer he/him]

Lightwards would probably just get ideas from this thread.

 

"Zombie spiders... check. Zombie bear... check. Note to self: don't let anyone stare it down. Zombie mountain lion... check. Zombie game warden... check. Zombie javelina... uh, check. I guess I can send them to root around in CorpseMaker's trash... or... something."

Should Lightwards ever read this I think we have bigger problems then the weird stuff he would animate, like him being real and knowing all our plans (alright that might not be that big an advantage ) plus a couple of weaknesses.

 

How would Lightwards react to being shipped?

[Kobold King he/him]

Should Lightwards ever read this I think we have bigger problems then the weird stuff he would animate, like him being real and knowing all our plans (alright that might not be that big an advantage ) plus a couple of weaknesses.

 

How would Lightwards react to being shipped?

 

There's not much on the Question threads he could use to his advantage... the PM discussions, however, could give him an enormous amount of usable information (as well as a substantial fright when he realizes how many people know his weakness.)

 

He would be immensely annoyed and would judge us all as imbeciles.

 

"Doctor Lighttimes" and "Leprechaun Revolution" would send him into a murderous rage, however.

[TwiLyghtSansSparkles she/her]

There's not much on the Question threads he could use to his advantage... the PM discussions, however, could give him an enormous amount of usable information (as well as a substantial fright when he realizes how many people know his weakness.)

He would be immensely annoyed and would judge us all as imbeciles.

"Doctor Lighttimes" and "Leprechaun Revolution" would send him into a murderous rage, however.

I would pay good money to see his face when his perusal of the shipping chart led him to "Leprechauns in Space."

Why do I get the feeling Nighthound wouldn't be in the least upset by "And then Nighthound died"?

[Edgedancer he/him]

There's not much on the Question threads he could use to his advantage... the PM discussions, however, could give him an enormous amount of usable information (as well as a substantial fright when he realizes how many people know his weakness.)

 

He would be immensely annoyed and would judge us all as imbeciles.

 

"Doctor Lighttimes" and "Leprechaun Revolution" would send him into a murderous rage, however.

On the (for him positive) downside he would also learn a lot of weaknesses, Nighthound´s included.

 

About the part where we ship him whit Lucentia and Möbius or the part where Koschei and mr Hamsterface get the girls?

 

I would pay good money to see his face when his perusal of the shipping chart led him to "Leprechauns in Space."

Why do I get the feeling Nighthound wouldn't be in the least upset by "And then Nighthound died"?

Nighthound would love his image in this thread.

[Kobold King he/him]

I would pay good money to see his face when his perusal of the shipping chart led him to "Leprechauns in Space."

 

Rough approximation.

 

[Edgedancer he/him]

Rough approximation.

 

Santa Calamity:Why naughty little Lightwards, it´s quite simple. The shipping mistress was such a good girl this year and for that I granted her the power of shipping. Now, go and be a nice little Epic and you might find a treat under your Christmas tree as well.

[TwiLyghtSansSparkles she/her]

Santa Calamity:Why naughty little Lightwards, it´s quite simple. The shipping mistress was such a good girl this year and for that I granted her the power of shipping. Now, go and be a nice little Epic and you might find a treat under your Christmas tree as well.

 

"A coupon for a free rollerskating session on Saturday at 7 PM? Didn't Funtimes get the same one?" 

"Did she? What a coincidence." 

"Are you—" 

"Trying to ship you and Funtimes by setting you up on what could be a blind date where you'll almost certainly run into each other, argue a bit, and finally decide to skate on your own at which point she'll teach you how to stop falling on your face and you'll both realize you have pretty decent chemistry? No, not at all." 

[Kobold King he/him]

"A coupon for a free rollerskating session on Saturday at 7 PM? Didn't Funtimes get the same one?" 

"Did she? What a coincidence." 

"Are you—" 

"Trying to ship you and Funtimes by setting you up on what could be a blind date where you'll almost certainly run into each other, argue a bit, and finally decide to skate on your own at which point she'll teach you how to stop falling on your face and you'll both realize you have pretty decent chemistry? No, not at all." 

 

His options are between skating with Funtimes, or hiking with Mobius. And the hiking path happens to go right by a warm but cramped cabin in the deep woods, and is scheduled for a day when it's certain to start pouring down rain, compelling the two hikers to seek refuge in said cabin to avoid getting wet... and, perhaps, to learn how nice it feels to be close to one another.

 

Calamity Claus is not a subtle supernova.

[mail-mi he/him]

Idea: Calamity is Santa in the Christmas Special.

[Lightsworn Panda he/him]

Hmm... Wonder what's the Oregon equivalent of the Easter Bunny...

 

Maybe The Panda should create an actual Easter Bunny.    When is What Happened in The Dalles set?

[TwiLyghtSansSparkles she/her]

His options are between skating with Funtimes, or hiking with Mobius. And the hiking path happens to go right by a warm but cramped cabin in the deep woods, and is scheduled for a day when it's certain to start pouring down rain, compelling the two hikers to seek refuge in said cabin to avoid getting wet... and, perhaps, to learn how nice it feels to be close to one another.

 

Calamity Claus is not a subtle supernova.

 

Idea: Calamity is Santa in the Christmas Special.

 

"Pardon me, Calamity Claus, but you seem to have made a mistake in my gifts." 

"Explain." 

"Well, you gave me a day of skating with Funtimes, followed by a hiking trip with Mobius. Both of these activities seem designed to get me as close to them as possible in situations known for their presence in both romantic dramas and romantic comedies. In other words, Calamity Claus, you seem to be attempting to pair me off with one of two women I hate." 

"And?" 

"And I seem to recall requesting martial arts lessons with Traveler." 

"Hmm….that is a problem." 

"Good. So you'll give me what I asked for, then?" 

"No, no, of course not. You see, punching Traveler made Funtimes quite angry. Quite angry, indeed. She is somewhat aware of the fact he hasn't the first idea how to throw a punch—of course, given his background, this should not surprise you." 

"I don't care about his background! I just want an excuse to punch him again!" 

"Yes, I understand. But you see, were I to grant this request, Funtimes would arrive just in time to see him receiving the pounding of his life. Placing you in a position uncomfortably close to her at her darkest. And I think we both know that is not where you want to be!" 

"So what are you saying? That my Christmas gift, the one thing I want this year, will kill me?" 

"I'm afraid so." 

*sigh* "Fine. Give me the hiking trip."