Occams Razor

Freshly raked, free of dead junkies, and finally cleared of crusty old snow, #5 Main Street looks like a new cabin.

Sure, there's a dingy clothesline run from the door to the gnarled old tree, and it's fairly well hung with clothes- burned, bloodied, slashes up clothes.

And, yes, someone has affixed a ram's skull over the door, its great horns twisted and its empty eye sockets just a tad too dark.

But, none of that is worth the look that the freshly hung sign attracts:

WALKER FAMILY SQUATCH TOURS

Some copies of the latest The Last Free Voice have been tacked up beneath the sign, the story titled "Destruction Leaves a Big Footprint" circled in pink and red ink.

Sally Lautner sits in a camp chair that's seen better days, one of Ondrej Vlk's fine beers in hand, and he calls out to all that pass by, "Don't ya'll miss out on the fine weather- this here is SQUATCHIN' weather, I tell ya true, and we's gonna catch a glimpse!"

Alice steps out of Main Street #6, dressed in a pair of dark wash jean shorts, plus her combat boots. She wore her blue and grey striped tanktop, bloodstained as ever, and carried her baseball bat up on one shoulder. She had a draw string bag that looked like it had seen better days and read "Planet Hollywood" in faded lettering. A few yards travel took her to Sally's porch, where she walked up the stairs and to his side, settling down beside him on the weathered planks, leaning partially against his chair and partially against the wall, the bat leaning against the railing absently.

Once there, she pulled out a trade paperback that was placed in her lap, opened, and stared at. She sat without speaking as time passed, until, finally.

"What is a Sasquatch? Is it like a Wendigo?"

The lurking figure of JD emerges from the tiny door on the front of the cabin. His clothes look newly washed, boots polished, and much more put together than normal. He has been hiding out in the cabin, hardly leaving accept to make calls to family for the past month. Now with the morning period over, he takes his place in the lawn chair next to sally and opens the cooler. Pulling out a bottle of Lemon seltzer he starts the first of what is going to be many cigarettes for the afternoon.

“Depends on who you are asking Alice, most folk don’t pay to much attention to the difference between their monsters so speak about Squach and Wendigo as if they are one in the same. I assure you there are two different beasts. “

JD looks around and sighs “Yup” he says to no one in particular.

Normally the tense young woman raised all of her hackles when someone approached, especially from behind her, but when JD roused from the house she barely reacted. If anything, her shoulders relaxed further, her face less troubled and more thoughtful.

"What is the difference? I have never encountered a Wendigo, nor know if they are even real. I have simply read of the mythology stemming from the......" she frowned, her brow furrowing as if trying to recall something on the tip of her tongue. She sighed and shook her head. "From the Native American tribes. The main theme between them seemed to be surrounding cannibalism," Alice looked up from her book as it was closed with one hand, her fingers splaying across the cover.

"You say both of these creatures are real? What differentiates the Sasquatch? Are they dangerous? Does it have to do with..." she faultered, shifting uncomfortably and biting her lip. "With, the, uh... With what I saw? On the glasses?"

“The umm… well.. sorry.”

JD takes a long drink from his seltzer; he clears his throat and seems to be trying hard to keep his emotions under control.

“ I have run into a few things over the years that locals called “Sasquatch” often times it was some kind of hunter spirit, once just a homeless man, other times flesh and blood something or other. There are real mythologies that all point to similar concepts, but in the unseen world furry, cannibalistic, and mean are just all to common to get a lock down on one creature. So I aint ready to say “yes that is THE Sasquatch” but I sure as hell will charge a credit to tourists to tell em it is.”

JD lights up another cigarette

“Sally here knows an awful lot about some random stuff, I am sure he’s read some of the stories and can explain a bit better what the legends say about what makes a Squach and wendigo different. To me, it just doesn’t matter much. They are both things moving about on the edge of … “ He gestures wildly to the road, buildings, and telephone wires “… all this, and ain’t looking to play nice.”

Kicking back the last swig of the TRDC beer, Sally will stretch out in the camp chair and tilt over towards Alice, "My dear Chickadee, JD ain't wrong, I know a thang er two 'bout a thang er two, 'specially 'bout thangs er two that make they home in them there woods."

Sally stares into the mouth of the bottle for a long moment, his brow furrowed and said, "Firs' things firs', 'cause JD's got the right of it- they ain't no single such thing as a Sasquatch." He looks back up and catches Alice cool, even eyes, and grins, "That ain't to say they ain't no Squatch- jus' callin' all the thing that go troddin' thru the underbrush on feets bigger 'n mine all the same thing is like callin' all Spanish-speakin' folk 'Mex-i-cans.'" Sally's furrowed brow comes back and he levels a finger at no one in particular- "Don't do that. They get right pissed at that."

Shaking his head, Sally says, "Some Canadian newspaper man in the twenties started usin' Sasquatch as a catch-all. Easier that way, since jus' bout ev'ry Indian folk, an' ev'ry other backwoods bubba all 'round the country's got they own bigfoot. From the ass-end of A-las-ka to the over yonder in Maine, 'n ev'ry stretcha woods betwixt 'em. All of 'em. Some of 'em peaceable, some of 'em is ornery, and some of 'em..."

Leaning in to the point that the camp chair starts to groan some, Sally says "I'm named fer a fella back home called Sally the Spaniard, who was really Salleh the Shawnee- an Indian, ya get? When I was just a shit-kickin' trouble maker two-heads taller than ev'ry one else in my grade, he'd sit a buncha us down, light up one of his big fat pipes, and talk about 'trail stories.' He'd sprinkle some tobacca on the ground, and tell us 'bout the Wiindigoo- that is ta say, the Wend-i-go. He had kinfolk that married into the tribes up north- Wisconsin, the Yuu-Pee, Sault Ste. Marie, and they all just about got stories of the Wendigo. They ain't peaceable."

Drumming his fingers against his scarred knee, Sally will glance over to JD, "JD's got the right of it - they's all sortsa things people call Sasquatch- huntin' spirits n' lost hunters... but a Wendigo? Issa _hunger_ spirit, at best. Somethin' glutt-in-ous, somethin' that'll eat an' eat an' eat an' eat an' never get full. They come in on the wind in some stories, and others, they plod through the snow, whisperin' fer help in the voice of folks that gone missin'. In some stories, they come about when the winter's at its coldest, the night at its darkest, and when people at they most desperate. Desperate people might do somethin' best left undone. Turnin' cannibal is to call fer that beast- call fer it right inside yousself."

Looking back to Alice, Sally says, "But in some stories, the Wendigo's always been 'round. Always loomin' in the shadows, waitin' fer cold wind to blow in and bring it back with the winter. Of all the stories ol' Sally the Spaniard told, that was one that never got stale."

Shaking his head, Sally will say, "Iffin' they's somethin' in them woods other than moths and gas-suckers and Big Fuckin' Butchers, maybe it's just an ornery local-type Sasquatch. Maybe it's jus' an old re-tarded crank, 'or a spirit of the Wild Hunt, or maybe it's a large-footed apeman with a bad temper. Givin' that every other local here's an ornery shit head, that would make some sorta sense. I wouldn't bet that somethin' with a trackin' tag round its ankles is a Windigo- since a good number of the stories point out that a Wendigo ain't got much below the knee. But, all the same..."

Sally's voice drops low, "We got more demons stalkin' through these parts than can be healthy for a local soul. We got vampers. We got ghosts choppin' off school girls' paws. We got a bunch prisoners executed by Napalm just over on that island. They's a lot of dead, dark things in these parts now, and we just come through one long, hard winter. We on Indian land. And, I don't think I need to point out that more 'n one of our fellow out-side-ers chaws down on dead folk ev'ry now and then. This here is a bad fuckin' place we in. Like calls to like."

Hopping to his feet, Sally says, "But that ain't our prollum, not yet. Our prollum is flesh and blood. An' most things flesh n' blood is allergic to lead, like anything else. So, if folks want to go wanderin' through the woods lookin' fer Big Feetses, who better to lead 'em than this crew?"

Alice listened, as enraptured as she ever was when Sally began his passionate speechifying. It was only halfway through that the spell seemed to break and she rapidly set the book aside (True Grit to anyone paying attention) and pulled out a faded journal and pen, flipping through the pages in a panic before she began to scrawl rapidly, trying to keep up with his words. She wrote and wrote and wrote.

Until Sally spoke the words "We got ghosts choppin' off school girls' paws." at which point she went stock still. She didn't look up from her book, but the pen stopped moving, and she sat frozen like a statue, staring blankly forward. Goosebumps raised along her arms, and after a long few seconds, she began to tremble violently, her breathing becoming erratic and staggered.