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Tweak says, "Not my gum drop button"

Sam Winchester (tallerthanthou) wrote in marinanova,
@ 2013-05-12 13:43:00

Entry tags:

:class, :mingle, artemis crock, bonnie bennett, buffy summers, dawn summers, elena gilbert, jack harkness, kitty pryde (aoa), klara guildsen, laura kinney, martha jones, peggy carter, piper halliwell, puck, saitou yakumo, sam winchester, spencer reid, tear grants, xander harris, yuuki kuran, zero kiryuu

Class 002 : Day 218 : Wendigo [action]
Welcome or welcome back to Paranormal Studies.

[Sam starts off with another disclaimer-type comment for the new students as he did at the beginning of his last class about how this isn't a class on hunting.]

Topic: Wendigo

Today, we're talking about wendigos. The name means "evil that devours" and it's a pretty good description. They were actually human once, but something happened to them. Something extreme. Maybe long, cold winters without enough supplies. Whatever the case, they find themselves turning to cannibalism to survive. Obviously, not every cannibal becomes a wendigo, but some do. It changes them. The get taller, leaner, faster, stronger, vicious and always hungry. [Sometimes this class sounds like a scary story, doesn't it? He should teach around a campfire.]

They often hibernate for long periods of time, storing live food. Meaning they abduct and hold people, eating them slowly, stripping off pieces of skin and keeping them alive as they do it as long as possible.

It's the perfect hunter. It has all the power it needs for any prey and the intelligence too. It can stalk you without you knowing it's there, biding it's time to take out a full traveling party. It can also imitate human voices to lure you out.

[ WENDIGO ]

Case Study: Black Water Ridge, Colorado

We—Dean and I—were sent coordinates to Black Water Ridge, Colorado, where we discovered a Tommy Collins had gone missing on a hike. With some research I found people had been going missing in that area in 23-year cycles. We needed better information of what we were up against, so we found a survivor of a "bear" attack. [He actually uses the finger quotes, yes.] It's not unusual for people to come up with neat labels for things that don't make any sense to them, so it's important to look through all records for anything that doesn't seem to fit. Sometimes it's swamp gas or unusual diseases or animal attacks. This time it was a bear attack.

The survivor was able to tell us the thing that killed his family was smart and fast and didn't sound like a man or an animal. With a little more research we were able to figure out we were up against the Wendigo.

Knowing that didn't exactly make things easy from there. We ended up out in the forest with a guide, and Tommy Collin's sister and younger brother. We had to keep all of them safe while finding and rescuing Tommy and not getting ourselves killed in the process. The guide didn't make it. [He clears his throat a little. It's one of those moments where the weight of turning hunting into a class topic catches up to him. He's talking about some pretty strong subjects here even if this was a pretty easy case compared to a lot of what he faced. There was always a body count.]

We did recover Tommy. The Wendigo had been storing people in an abandoned mine. Dean also managed to kill the Wendigo.

[ BLACK WATER RIDGE, COLORADO ]

Practical: Defense of Wendigo

So, how did we do it? Fire. They are vulnerable to it. He was shot once in the chest with a flare gun. There are also some protection symbols from the Anasazi. If they're drawn correctly and you stay in their area of protection they'll act as a ward, keeping a wendigo at bay. A lot of taking them on is knowledge, skill, and luck. There is no conventional fighting with them, but it's also possible silver-tipped arrows can take them down.

[ ANASAZI SYMBOLS ]

Questions & Discussion

Okay, I think that's everything I had. Has anyone else ever heard of or encountered a Wendigo or something similar? Or are there any questions?

(OOC: Backdated to late afternoon. Mingle style. Notifs are off so tag Sam during class with questions or catch him before or after. Use your discretion with the links provided. Sam didn't necessarily cover every detail, but feel free to bring more into it. Warnings for talk of cannibalism and torture.)

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	Questions tallerthanthou 2013-05-12 06:46 pm UTC (link)
	[For all your during class questioning or discussing needs. Feel free to threadjack around on these too.] (Reply to this) (Thread)

♦ action

the_dawnster
2013-05-12 09:09 pm UTC (link)

She's pretty sure that the demon Gnarl that went after Willow was a Wendigo, with the way Sam describes them. Anyway, Dawn's hand is raised. She wants to know all about the research since that's kind of her forte as well. And when Sam looks her way she smiles brightly. "Hi! I've run into a Wendigo before. So what kind of research did you do to discover that it was a Wendigo and not a bear attack? Is it cause people were flayed alive instead of ripped apart?"

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tallerthanthou
2013-05-12 09:39 pm UTC (link)

"There were a few things in the report that didn't line up. The door was in tact like it had just been left open, but the survivor said it was locked. Bears aren't that good at unlocking doors. At best the might knock it down if they were rabid, but there wasn't any mention of it being broken. And the bodies weren't flayed, they were missing. A bear might have drug one away for later, but two? It just didn't add up."

Pausing, "You've run into one?" Tell him more!

(OOC: Relying on notes and wiki and making stuff up that seems to fit. I've seen it a few times and fairly recently, but not within the last day or anything.)

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the_dawnster
2013-05-13 12:09 am UTC (link)

"I'm pretty sure it was one from the description of them you gave. This one was in the forested area around Sunnydale. It had burrowed away in a network of caves. We only knew about it because a few of its prey were left out in the open, skinless. Which... double ew." Her nose wrinkles. But she's also more than willing to talk about this kind of stuff. Or... you know... just talk in general. "But when it was found, it was peeling a friend of ours skin off strip by strip. It had some kind of poison in its claws... and when I say claws I mean super long scary and sharp claws."

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	tallerthanthou 2013-05-13 02:35 am UTC (link)
	This is Sam nodding along. Maybe the similarities weren't perfect, but it was close. "I never found any records of poison mentioned, but it might have been missed. Ours have claws too. Large enough to simulate a bear attack at least. Do you know what the poison did exactly?" Look at him just as willing to talk about the ew. (Reply to this) (Parent) (Thread)

the_dawnster
2013-05-13 06:18 pm UTC (link)

"Oh! Uhm. Yeah. It had a toxin in it that could paralyze a person. Easier for the demon to sit and strip away the skin. Which... totally creepy cause can you imagine being awake while that was happening?" Deep breath and she shakes her head. She's not even gonna mention the pose-able part and how much fun Anya had had with that. "But it was only a temporary paralysis so... there's that."

But wait. "Crazy how many things are vulnerable to fire. Or... to having their eyes gouged out by super slayer strength. What makes you think silver is a thing too? I mean, yeah lots of ooglie booglies are silver deficient but did you attack it with something silver?"

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tallerthanthou
2013-05-28 04:50 pm UTC (link)

Temporary until you're dead from the sound of it.

And now Sam is thinking about eye gouging. That is definitely not one of their go-to moves, but then they also don't have slayer strength.

"Well, no, it wasn't something we tried, but when we had our Dad's journal of notes. Some of that he learned first hand and some of it is from research or talking to other hunters and finding out what worked for them."

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	Questions doesntdamsel 2013-05-14 04:07 pm UTC (link)
	Buffy doesn't raise her hand the way Dawn does, but she waits for a lull and speaks up. "How do they feel about beheading? I mean I know you said fire and hey, you'd be surprised what fire will kill, but ditto for beheading. I like options. I'm an options girl. You know, CD player, leather trimmed seats, nice sharp scythe to go with the flame thrower." (Reply to this) (Parent) (Thread)

tallerthanthou
2013-05-28 07:26 am UTC (link)

I haven't actually tried it, but it seems like a safe bet. Safer to burn afterward just to make sure. [But then burning is kind of his comfort zone.]

But this shouldn't really be about killing. [He wouldn't mind that really. He'd want a smaller audience for it, and it would be for a flow of information about hunting different creatures in different places, but this class is mostly about earning rehab points for the many things he wants to request and he's not sure he can do that if he's teaching killing 101. Not to mention things will get dicey when he has a class on vampires or werewolves.]

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	doesntdamsel 2013-05-30 09:42 pm UTC (link)
	And it cleans everything up. Plus, you can make s'mores.. [She might or might not be kidding. Who knows.] Right. Information only. [She taps her head with one finger.] Got it. Stored it. Steel trap up here. (Reply to this) (Parent) (Thread)

	tallerthanthou 2013-06-08 02:53 am UTC (link)
	[It is safe to say she is not like any hunter he has ever known before. He likes that about her. He might just be smiling here and a little bit hoping she'd never really make s'mores that way.] Good to hear. [His look lasts a little longer. Maybe in a "but if you want to talk after class" kind of way. Hopefully not in a creepy way.] (Reply to this) (Parent) (Thread)

	doesntdamsel 2013-06-08 05:23 am UTC (link)
	[ she gets that little bit of a look and it's not creepy, at least she doesn't think it's creepy. she'll also definitely hit him up to talk about this later. ] Thanks. (Reply to this) (Parent)

action

notamasochist
2013-05-15 01:55 pm UTC (link)

Similarities to his world are a little uncanny...even if the end result was a little different. It's more the differences that Zero is curious about though. "Question? I'm assuming you are referring to them as an evolved species and not just something random humans turned into during their lives. You said they are taller than leaner than humans, but do they still maintain the appearance of humanity? Could they blend into society if they wanted to?"

Because this so called "cold winter" is what caused humans to evolve into vampires in his world.

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	action tallerthanthou 2013-05-28 08:13 am UTC (link)
	Sam nods, taking the questions in. "No, I was actually thinking of individuals changing over their own lifetime. It just gets a lot longer after the change. You wouldn't mistake one of these for human anymore. I think most people would be surprised they were ever human." (Reply to this) (Parent) (Thread)

	action notamasochist 2013-06-01 01:05 am UTC (link)
	"So they think it's sparked by something that happens to them?" He's confused a little because how could so much change due to environment unless it was something specific in the environment that did it. "There are always just one?" (Reply to this) (Parent) (Thread)

	action tallerthanthou 2013-06-08 03:04 am UTC (link)
	"That's the story anyway. It's...not an exact science." Yeah, he knows there are strange parts and holes in some of these things, but he's had to do a lot more with a lot less. (Reply to this) (Parent)

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