Pupal Time
In 1930 Willam Beebe, a well-respected and ahead of his time marine biologist, used a makeshift submersible to explore the deep ocean off the coast of Bermuda. During his multiple expeditions Beebe saw and described five never before seen species of fish to an illustrator he brought with him.
A quartet of Abyssal Rainbow Gar,
A small school of Five-Lined Constellation Fish,
Giant Dragonfish hunting in a pair,
A Pallid Sailfin gliding eerily through the water,
And a single Three-Starred Anglerfish.
None of the five species have been seen since.
Whether Beebe misidentified and/or fabricated them, the artist failed to properly render them, they are yet to be discovered, or if they each have gone extinct has yet to be determined.
7 hours before the news broke, Point Pleasant, West Virginia. A local forensics technician vents his mixed feelings to his motherâŚ
Mom. Those bones I was telling you about? Itâs him, itâs absolutely him. No, we canât say that officially for a few reasons. God, 57 years. A whole city spends 57 fucking years searching for him and of course he was sitting dead in the middle of nowhere. Oh thatâs the other really frustrating thing, this is the greatest discovery our careers and weâre damned if we do and damned if we donât. If we say itâs him then theyâll say weâre lying for attention, and if we say itâs not him there will be a conspiracy that weâre part of a cover up. Weâre trying to figure that out, but thereâs so many factors to decomposition, species is definitely one of them, were still trying to place him in a phylum. Some of the other technicians are talking about doing some more advanced dating techniques but given the subject itâs anybodyâs guess as to whether or not theyâll be accurate.
7 hours after the news broke, Point Pleasant, West Virginia. A grandmother gets a phone call from an old friendâŚ
Hi, you hear about the skeleton? Yeah, they wonât say it but everyone within a hundred miles knows who it is, there simply isnât anything else it can be. My cousin had her doubts, but by the time they put the skull back together she was convinced, funny what those enormous eyes are still doing things to people ey? The bones are in an awful state, just sitting on the forest floor for God knows how long, letting nature reclaim him, or maybe just claim him. Well the thing is theyâre not sure, could've been 6 months, could've been the full 60 years since last we saw him, before they found him nobodyâd been in those boonies for a century at least. No, they still canât figure out what did the Mothman in, couldâve been exposure, illness, malnutrition... Me? I like to think it was old age. In a way Iâm happy for him, better to live and die like an animal than live and die in a cage, but like hell weâll ever get his opinion on that.
Not just me, the whole town is in mourning, Iâve never seen so many flowers around a statue before. That fucking statue, we already knew it didnât look a damn thing like him but now it just feels insulting. Heh, itâs real funny, an entire city in grief over a monster, like we didnât build our whole lives around finding whatever rock he crawled under and dragging him out against whatever will he mightâve had. Hey Billy, next rounds on me.
The week the news broke, Point Pleasant, West Virginia. Sightings of Mothman have spiked since the news broke, given the nature of the news they have been given a bit more attention than usual. 100% have been confirmed to either be hoaxes or false identifications of other animals/phenomenon. With each false lead the reports slow.
9 hours after the news broke in Point Pleasant, West Virginia. A radio host gives her 2 centsâŚ
In my opinion, this will only better the town in the long run. Like, what would Scotland do if they found Nessie floating belly up? Would they just take her off of all the postcards and store front signs and mugs and say thatâs that? No, theyâd give her a proper funeral as thanks for all she did just by living, parade her through whatever Scotlandâs capital city is and throw flowers to her and play her songs, people would come from all over to finally catch a fleeting glimpse at the reality behind the myth. Thatâs whatâll happen here, even though the Smithsonian has already scooped up the bones by now the history, fictional included, of the Mothman is here to stay.
Now there has been talk about doing one last massive search in that area, either trying to find more of the Mothmanâs kind or saying the skeletons a fake, I donât particularly believe either of those, but can you even imagine how many people will come from out of town for that? It wonât just be conspiracy nuts, Iâd bet money that itâll be just as many zoologists wanting to be the first to find a Mothman nest and the like.
The day the news broke, Point Pleasant, West Virginia. Every store in the city has sold out of flowers. The 12-foot-tall sculpturesâ feet and pedestal are cluttered with bouquets, books written about him, childrenâs drawings, cupcakes that look like his face, and reproductions of old newspapers all piled on top of each other. The older folks have been writing down their experiences with the Mothman and placing them at the statue, a couple years later a tourist will compile and publish them and get their 15 minutes. The Silver Memorial Bridge has seen a spike in graffiti, either saying the Mothman was innocent in collapsing its predecessor or celebrating that he got away with it, all of them are telling him to rest in peace.
2 days after the news broke, Point Pleasant, West Virginia. The worldâs only Mothman Museum hasnât had half of much business in its 19 years of operation than it has this one weekend. Memorabilia cannot stay on the shelves, thereâs a line outside stretching blocks, staff have given interviews to news crews and documentarians of varying quality. Before long theyâre going to put art of his remains on t-shirts alongside ones of him in flight. There has already been talk of having the festivalâs hayride tour take a detour to where the bones were found.
A month after the news broke, Point Pleasant, West Virginia. A tourist makes small talk in a DinerâŚ
The Mothman was a thing known more for its publicity than anything else. Yâknow not a single report likened it to a moth? But the newspapers needed an eye-catching name and âbatmanâ was taken and âbirdmanâ doesnât roll off the tongue quite as nicely. None of them mentioned it having arms either, just wings, but there isnât as much story behind a humungous bird compared to an insectoid angel monster.
No, looking into stuff like this is just my hobby. Well, this particular case will probably have a similar effect to the platypus. When dead platypus specimens were brought to scientists, they thought they were just taxidermy sewn together, but when they were confirmed to be real creatures it sort of lowered the bar as to what people will believe, possibly why things like the Fiji Mermaid and Hodag were such a success. Iâm certain that there being a molehill of truth behind a mountain legend will cause a wave of other hoaxes and snowballing misidentifications, itâs probably already in effect actually.
Well, before the skeleton was found the theories were all over the place, actually theory is too strong a word, more like a bunch of hypotheses. Letâs see, Iâve heard displaced Cornish Owlman, an omen of disaster, a stranded alien, a mutant bug from the TNT Area, none of which had any actual evidence or came from even a remotely credible source.
After the grief has subsided, Point Pleasant, West Virginia. The Mothman Festival is expecting more attention than it can handle and is gathering funds for an overhaul. The following search has the biggest turnout the town will ever see, believers and skeptics from across the country hunt side by side. Whether or not they find anything most of them will gather here again on the following years, more than likely on the anniversary of the skeletonâs discovery and do it over. The sculpture, now over 20 years old, has been moved into the museum and replaced with something deemed a bit more respectable, both for the town and the creature itâs paying tribute too. Not including the pedestal, the new sculpture stands 5 feet tall, a detailed reconstruction of the full skeleton. There was also an estimate as to what it would look like alive, but the artist felt it had too much speculation. The back of the pedestal gives a brief history of the creature while the front simply reads:
The Mothman of Point Pleasant.
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