“Fiction” seems the least unsuitable part of BFF, to which to submit the following. It could be that “fanfic” is reckoned inappropriate on BFF, in which case the moderators will doubtless act accordingly, and instruct me to cease and desist from any further such doings – but “you don’t know till you try”.

Recent “General Discussion” involving the American Civil War, brought unbidden to my mind – as follows…


Corporal Coy and Private Green, of the Union Army, on campaign in Tennessee, are getting a brief spell of leisure in their encampment. Coy is sitting on a log, immersed in the latest issue of the “Crypto-Zoological Gazette”. Green says to him:

Say, Corp, why don’tcha hire a substitute to do yer fightin’ for ya, an’ stay around here, an’ live in the woods an’ look for them Bigfoot thangs that you’re always on about?

C: The idea sure is temptin’. And it’d likely be less dangerous than fightin’ the Rebs.

G: Right on – you’re always sayin’ they’re gentle critters if ya don’t provoke ‘em. Ya
could get ‘em used to ya, little by little, like – offer ‘em food, get their trust – ya
could rightly make friends with the varmints.

C: You got some good notions, Green. If it worked, it could be the greatest scientific
discovery of the nineteenth century – that Darwin guy’d love it, wouldn’t he
just?

G: Yeah – an’ ya could write a book about it, an’ make yaself a fortune…

C: Still – remember that prisoner we took a while back, from the Florida Regiment – I
got talkin’ to him before they sent him back to the rear – he said that in Florida, they
got more an’ awesomer Bigfoots than round here – more likely to meet up with ‘em
-- “Skunk-apes” they call ‘em, if you’ll believe that – maybe that’s the best chance
fer it in the East…

G: Aw, get real, Corp – he was just yankin’ ya chain – talkin’ bullshit to the enemy,
hopin’ to send him on a wild goose chase. Skunk-apes, fer Chrissakes! Likely tell.

C: Mebbe ya right. Tell ya what I’ll do, if I live through this war, and get real rich from
loot from it…

G: O.K. – what’ll ya do?

C: Light straight out fer Washington Territory, where the real Bigfoot action is, an’
stay there till I find the critter, an’ make him known to science, an’ git truly
rich from the proceeds of that, an’ git on friendly terms with the Bigfoot – stay there
the rest of my life, to do that – an’ they an’ us can be friends from there on out…

G: Yeah, an’ then you wake up.