Butterfly Butterfly 3/6/68

Chapter 3: A Warm Safe Place

"Wake up," I said gently shaking my daughter's shoulder. She was pale as a ghost and horribly cold yet she was sweating. When I pulled my hand away a trail of stickiness followed.

She opened her eyes and saw the trail of stickiness, "O-god, it's happening to me too. In about three seconds your going to pass out," She muttered. It was just as she said and three seconds later the world was black.

When I came too she was gone but she left a trail of the sticky stuff behind. I remember the scientists saying that the sticky fluid is produced about an hour before the cocooning process starts. It's a more concentrated toxin than what's in the cocooning material that causes sleep. Or more accurately unconsciousness for about three hours. The cocooning process takes about five hours so I spent the next two hours looking all over the house for her.

Finally I found her out back in the storage shed hidden behind a bunch of old boxes. If I wasn't too late I should be able to pull her out without hurting her. They tried that with Aponicho and she nearly died. I stuck my hands deep into the cocoon and started to pull it apart when loud screams of pain filled my mind. I jumped back and in moments the hole closed itself. Naturally I blacked out for another three hours.

The next day scientists came to see if they could help her. After all we don't know what's happening in the cocoon because it vibrated at just the right frequencies so ultra sounds don't work and has too much metal in it for x-rays to work either. It's hard to believe it's been four years since she came home crying because her best friend was in a cocoon.

Since that day Lexi has run a low temperature of 60 degrees. They found a chemical in her system that when recreated was the green and blue serums she'd talked about. So we've guessed this day was coming but four years passed and I let my guard down because nothing had happened.

The scientists made one new break through because the cocoon is so new. They stuck a thermometer and a night vision camera in. Lexi complained a bit, as they put it in, by giving off a low frequency noise that made someone deaf for a few hours and made the ears bleed. Well she wasn't particularly doing it but it was a defense against doing stupid stuff like putting a camera in her cocoon while she's in such a fragile state.

The thermometer shot up to 150 degrees at just a few inches in. They hypothesized it was probably two hundred degrees at the center. The inside is also filled with a warm sticky slimy substance. It was allot like what would be found in the womb of a baby and provided nutrients and oxygen. It also appeared to be what was giving off the heat.

The camera showed us her back. Her hair seems to be in constant motion as if she was in water. Her golden red hair spread around her like a fiery halo. She also wasn't wearing a thing. Yet the scientists were more interested in a crack that had appeared down her back along her spinal column. Over the next few days we watched a papery thing start to grow. At another angle two large bumps were visibly sticking out of her hair and grew out into antennas.

After that we determined the things must be wings. Most likely butterfly wings. If she was conscious she would most likely be freezing and in a lot of pain. The purpose of the cocoon became clear then. It's a warm safe place for them to slowly change so they aren't too cold or in a place where germs could potentially harm them.

The question of how long they would be in there was answered about three months in. A report came in the police officers guarding Aponicho had been knocked out cold along with the scientists who saw her come out. They described it like a hollow rock cracking open and she fell out in a mass of the fluid that had cooled and turned to gel. Then they'd been knocked out before they could do anything.

Four years later Lexi's cocoon did the same thing.

"It seems to be cooling down." A scientist said measuring the temperature which now was at 120 degrees.