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Eyrie Productions, Unlimited
Gryphon
Charter Member
8557 posts |
Apr-15-08, 08:48 PM (EDT) |
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"Mysteries of the Cosmos: The Lake Daniels Monster"
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Mysteries of the Cosmos The Lake Daniels Monster By Kenneth Eliot It was one of the enduring questions of the early settlement period in Avalon County: How can a completely artificial environment like the Avalon pseudocontinent have cryptids? There was nothing living within an astronomical unit of the spot where the pseudocontinent was constructed; everything that lives there must have been put in place by the builders. How, then, to explain the persistent reports that something unplanned and unexpected lives in Lake Daniels? Since shortly after construction began on the city of New Avalon, sightings of some large, strange creature have been reported by people from all walks of life. By the time the New Avalon Cornet-Scientifer began publication in 2382, the legend of the Lake Daniels Monster was firmly established in the area's fast-developing local culture, but it was in the pages of the city's first newspaper that the creature first received the nickname by which it would come to be more familiarly known. Predictably enough, the Cornet-Scientifer reporter assigned to cover the story dubbed the monster "Danny". For twenty years, the controversy raged: Just what exactly was Danny? City planners and the people who developed the pseudocontinent swore they hadn't included anything bigger than some stocked Pescalian bladefish for gamefishing purposes, but those top out at eight feet long and don't have the long, flexible neck often reported in Danny sightings. In eyewitness reports and the odd blurry photograph, Danny appeared to be nothing so much as an ancient Earth plesiosaur. Lake monster myths are nothing new in Earth-descended human culture. Many freshwater lakes on the homeworld have been reputed to be the home of plesiosaur-like creatures over the centuries, most famously Loch Ness in Scotland, Lake Okanagan in British Columbia, and Lake Champlain Vermont. Few of these creatures have ever been definitively confirmed or definitively debunked (with the obvious exception of the Lake Champlain monster, Champ), giving them considerable cultural staying power. Many believed that Danny was either the result of a hoax or some kind of mass delusion originally based on the preponderance of humans of Earth descent in Avalon County's early settler base. The controversy continued until 2405, when two vacationing members of the Wedge Defense Force were shipwrecked while sailing a small catamaran not far from Great Cranberry Isle, off Waid Head at the southern end of Avalon Harbor. To their astonishment, the two WDF officers were rescued by a giant creature resembling (but not precisely) a plesiosaur. Once conveyed to shore on Great Cranberry, they took the first clear, verifiable photographs of the creature. The photos, published in the Cornet-Scientifer, Sphere magazine, and other publications around the galaxy, definitively proved that something lived in Lake Daniels. At this point, with the cat out of the bag, officers of the Wedge Defense Force's Life Sciences Division admitted that they had created the creature, releasing it into the lake during the Foundation Day celebration on July 4, 2381. When asked why, they pointed to the division's long-standing unofficial motto, You should because you can, and added that they wanted to give the brand-new Avalon settlement a little ready-made mystery and heritage. The origins of Danny are no longer a mystery, but the heritage part, at least, has come true. The Lake Daniels "Monster" - really a friendly and playful creature with intelligence and personality comparable to an earlier LSD creation, the engineered neocats - is often spotted plying the waters of Avalon Harbor and its environs, and often puts in an appearance for tour boats and recreational watercraft. He has become something of a mascot for the city's waterfront districts and the sprinkling of offshore islands that fall within the city's legal boundaries. A cartoon version serves as the "host" for Avalon Broadcasting Channel 17's Saturday morning children's entertainment block. Since going public, Danny has rescued shipwrecked recreational sailors at least twice more, and there are unconfirmed rumors that he has also destroyed at least one lakegoing vessel - a launch used by members of the Kempu ninja clan during the Big Fire attack on Terminal Island in 2409. Terminal Island is hundreds of miles from Danny's usual stamping grounds in the vicinity of Avalon Harbor, leading some to conclude that either that particular story is false, or that members of the International Police security detachment at Terminal Island Penitentiary are somehow able to summon him... ... or that there's more than one, a possibility the Life Sciences Division disclaims. |
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BobSchroeck
Charter Member
1609 posts |
Apr-15-08, 09:16 PM (EDT) |
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1. "RE: Mysteries of the Cosmos: The Lake Daniels Monster"
In response to message #0
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>Mysteries of the Cosmos > >The Lake Daniels Monster >By Kenneth Eliot Bravo! Nicely done, a wonderful bit of extra detail for New Avalon. >Few of these creatures have ever been definitively >confirmed or definitively debunked (with the obvious exception >of the Lake Champlain monster, Champ), Enquiring minds want to know... which way, and how/why? >When asked why, they pointed to the >division's long-standing unofficial motto, You should because you >can, Of course they did. <grin> >... or that there's more than one, a possibility the Life Sciences >Division disclaims. Yeah, like they've been forthcoming on this topic before. And why make just one which you'll presumably have to replace every few decades (unless, of course, it's got Detian genes <grin>), when a colony will be self-sustaining? -- Bob ------------------- I intend to be a freak for the rest of my life, and I shall baffle you with cabbages and rhinoceroses in the kitchen and incessant quotations from Now We Are Six through the mouthpiece of Lord Snooty's giant poisoned electric head. So theeeeeere... |
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Gryphon
Charter Member
8557 posts |
Apr-16-08, 01:07 AM (EDT) |
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2. "RE: Mysteries of the Cosmos: The Lake Daniels Monster"
In response to message #1
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>>Few of these creatures have ever been definitively >>confirmed or definitively debunked (with the obvious exception >>of the Lake Champlain monster, Champ), > >Enquiring minds want to know... which way, and how/why? In the mid-21st century, Champ quite dramatically battled and defeated a previously unencountered daikaiju (subsequent NATO designation "GINO"), which was endangering the children at a summer camp on the Vermont side of the lake with its rampage. This pretty much answered the "is there really a plesiosaur-like monster living in Lake Champlain?" question. Scientists now believe that Champ evolved from Elasmosaurus sometime around the K-T boundary, possibly with the aid of unknown radiation released in the wake of the Yucatán comet impact. She is believed to be immortal. This was by far the highest-profile lake monster event in modern history, and remains the most dramatic of all lake monster confirmations on Earth, which is why the author of the article above assumes the readers will already be familiar with the incident. Champ remains the officially designated guardian monster of Grand Isle, VT, and puts in an appearance every year at Lakefest. (For its part, the defeated GINO was eventually determined to be the product of an outlaw research lab connected to the international techno-terrorist organization Advanced Idea Mechanics. Before they started screwing with it, it was apparently some kind of marine iguana.) --G. -><- Benjamin D. Hutchins, Co-Founder, Editor-in-Chief, & Forum Admin Eyrie Productions, Unlimited http://www.eyrie-productions.com/
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Gryphon
Charter Member
8557 posts |
Apr-16-08, 09:23 PM (EDT) |
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4. "RE: Mysteries of the Cosmos: The Lake Daniels Monster"
In response to message #3
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>And the linked Wikipedia article references a movie called Godzilla >vs. the Gryphon, which was never produced as such in our reality. > >In UF, though, I wonder how Gojira Nakajima felt about co-starring >with The Chief?We didn't do that one, but we did have Godzilla vs. MegaZone and Godzilla vs. Mecha-MegaZone, back in the day... --G. -><- Benjamin D. Hutchins, Co-Founder, Editor-in-Chief, & Forum Admin Eyrie Productions, Unlimited http://www.eyrie-productions.com/
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Gryphon
Charter Member
8557 posts |
Apr-18-08, 01:01 PM (EDT) |
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10. "RE: Mysteries of the Cosmos: The Lake Daniels Monster"
In response to message #9
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>If they had called it anything but Godzilla, it would have been >a decent monster movie. But it wasn't a good Godzilla movie. It set up the most hilariously satisfying monster fight ever in Godzilla: Final Wars, though. >I feel the same way about the new Battlestar Galactica, >actually. From what I've seen of it, if you like creepy psycho-drama >horror in space, it's probably pretty good. But to me, it just doesn't >fit into the same mental folder as the campy space-opera original. 'Course, I jammed them together into one hideous two-headed monster anyway, 'cause that's how I roll. --G. -><- Benjamin D. Hutchins, Co-Founder, Editor-in-Chief, & Forum Admin Eyrie Productions, Unlimited http://www.eyrie-productions.com/
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version 3.3 © 2001
Eyrie Productions,
Unlimited
Benjamin
D. Hutchins
E P U (Colour)
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