It makes me miserable that Rick Yancey could've done more Monstrumologist books but was cut off and forced to rush an ending by Simon & Schuster. I feel like in general that time period had so much to offer that he could work with to come up with more story.
Personally, I've been thinking about a Wild Western episode. Just imagine:
It would probably start off at home, as it always does. They'd then receive a caller, as they often do. Some town in Texas is slowly losing residents who are disappearing one by one with no note, no prior notice, and no traces of them and their earthly possessions ever seen again. Well why call some dude in New England and not... The police? Because, Warthrop, I, the caller, maybe another member of the society, saw where they went. And it was something that only you could handle or understand or something idk.
Very well! Warthrop and Will Henry catch a train out West! They stay in this town and everything seems normal on the surface. To the point of boredom. But then the innkeeper disappears. So do the rows of keys he keeps behind him. No trace left. Maybe mass psychosis? Warthrop thinks. Hell nah. Visiting the church the next day, they overhear a sermon about a higher calling from the desert. Apparently you can find God there, whatever that means. This preacher is an obvious nut job. Ridiculous, says Warthrop. And still, in the middle of the night, Will Henry finds Warthrop... Packing up? Where is he going? Out to the desert. Will Henry follows, grabbing them horses. Who do they run into on the way in? Kearns! Because Kearns would thrive in the wild west and we're gonna need him for the next bit.
Kearns has been out here looking for something unrelated when his interest was peaked by the same story of residents randomly leaving the town. He agrees with Warthrop, probably mass psychosis, but could be interesting nonetheless. Warthrop, in one of his fits of mania, keeps them traveling for days and days until finally they reach the desert oasis. On the banks of the pool, there are piles upon piles of people's earthly belongings, including a pile of keys from their missing innkeeper. Warthrop gently sets down his own things, ties down his horse, and dives into the water, leaving Will Henry and Kearns confused. They wait for a bit, Kearns pointing a rifle at the water. He's got a feeling this won't end well. Nothing happens. Will Henry is convinced Warthrop didn't drag them all the way out there to drown himself so he dives in to look for him. He finds him laying at the bottom of the pool, almost sleeping? But with a pile of something covering and surrounding his neck. Will Henry yanks him out and drags him out of the water, but the minute he does, the entire ground beneath them starts shaking. There was something at the bottom of the pool and it was ANGRY. You know how I said we'd need Kearns? Well now's the time! He shoots the damn thing! Multiple times! And then it just... Dies? That's it?
Will Henry just barely wakes Warthrop up, who has finally returned from whatever reverie he was in. He says it felt like his mind was taken over by one thought, that of meeting God. Well good thing, says Kearns, I killed it. Warthrop and Kearns drag the corpse of the thing out of the water but they can't tell what it actually is. It's covered in sand and mud and crushed up bones. They wash it but it's still a mass of flesh. Eventually, Warthrop and Kearns start dissecting it while Will Henry has a crisis. Aha! It was just a simple (insert monster name here), which is known to have mind changing capabilities! But at this scale? To summon so many people? And typically they're much smaller than this? Well, the last fossil of this species was discovered many many years ago and was dated to be from around the first century... Well, my dear Pellinore, you've read Darwin, yes? It must've evolved. This is a new species.
Warthrop and Will Henry catalogue the thing while Kearns chops off the thing's head as a prize. They all return to the town but are met with... A mob? Why? They killed God. Wait a minute, so that means if everyone immediately knew the monster died, then even if they weren't drawn by it to go get eaten in a lake, it was already in their minds? Ohh. It really was their god. This town, as it turns out, pumped water from that desert oasis. So they literally had that creature within them, and it at random picked people to come over and get eaten. Why and how was Warthrop chosen? Because he drank the water there. But he was able to snap out of it so quickly because he only drank a little bit, meanwhile this town had been drinking the water for decades! Where were we again? Oh right, the mob. Warthrop tries to explain it all to them, using that dry lecturing tone of his, but of course no one is listening. Probably doesn't help that Kearns is holding its giant severed head. Why would they? Who the hell is this guy anyway? And so, Warthrop, Will Henry, and Kearns are chased out of the town.
The story would end on the train ride home, after Kearns had gone off to do his own thing. Warthrop goes on and on about faith and belief and how isolation makes people unaware of what's normal. Yeah, Will Henry thinks, it does, doesn't it?
stormborns
amandla
blakekathryn
titsay
theartofmadeline
2087
