The Unnatural History of Cryptozoology

Chapter 18

After 20 minutes of speed reading, Lyssa's mouth was hanging open in a very unladylike manner.  Grace Hightower had not only written in depth about Atlantis, she also speculated about the historical and ongoing fascination with the mythical city.    

Forty minutes into reading, the hair on Lyssa's neck stood on end to the point of pain.  She couldn't remember the last time she had such a physical reaction to reading something, if ever.   Maybe The Lost World, the follow-up to Jurassic Park where Datsun realizes that staying still doesn't work right before T-Rex  eats him.  Lyssa wasn't sure she was even remembering it right but that was the last time she remembered getting chills from the written word. 

In conclusion Dr. Hightower surmised that many of Earth's mysteries about life on Earth, Evolution and what we as a species believed to myth were in fact due to the dismissive nature of humans when they don't understand something.   She was a believer, Lyssa felt it in her in bones, despite the summary that accompanied the thesis indicating that the paper was nothing more than an exploration of Art, Archeology and Human Culture. 

She came to NHM for the artifact.  That's why it was still sitting on her desk, and why she was so defensive about Lyssa poking her unimaginative nose around. 

Lyssa drafted a letter to Stephen. 

Stephen,

Hope you are doing well and have a chance to read this before we meet again.  The author is in residence at NHM, she may have an artifact you will find interesting.   

-Lyssa 

She started to delete the email.  She was loosing her mind, there was nothing scientific leading her, the only thing leading her was Stephen Collins.   "Shit!" she pressed send before she could change her mind.  Then cleared her history, deleted her sent item, deleted it again.  Turned off her mobile hotspot and VPN then closed her laptop.  

Lyssa really wasn't all that tech savvy she just like to pretend she knew how to cover her tracks--this is all information she got from movies and books so it was likely all bullshit but it made her feel better. 

She pushed to return her focus on her actual work.   Spring Break was looming and despite needing a break she was not looking forward to it.   Shortly after setting aside her work for Stephen her volunteer had showed up and started doing data entry at warp speed.    She was going to have to come up with something else for her to do. 

After some thought she thought it was  good time to inventory the collection--not counting each item or recording them but checking the cabinets for pests and the small blue tags that were left in the drawers when someone borrowed specimen.    Last year when they had to remove all items and place the study skins in the freezers to kill beetles and beetle larva she discovered that multiple items in the collection had been checked out for over 6-months.   She could have her volunteers track down the items, get an eta on their return and make sure all records of checked out items were current.   It was long overdue. 

There were also a hodge podge of specimens that currently had no home, skeletons, skulls and even wet specimens that were floating around in boxes that needed to be properly catalogued and stored. 

Satisfied that she had just come up with a way to keep her volunteers busy for the next few months,  she typed up the details in an easily digestible format.  Created a checklist that volunteers could follow including IF/THEN scenarios to help guide them. 

At lunch, she realized she wasn't hungry or at the minimum she didn't really want to eat.   She was pining part of her thought she should be disgusted with herself but the other part of her thought it was romantic.    

She took these periods of loss of appetite to actually eat something healthy.   In the cafeteria she picked out a quinoa greek salad  and purchased a bottle of ice tea. 

Unaware of the museum guests around she turned to head back to her office and ran right into Olivia. 

"No junk food today Dr. Harding?" 

"I thought I would give my gut a break." Lyssa tried to sound casual. 

"Helen is going to send you a google meet invite with Vienna, it's going to be at 5:30 AM our time so you can take the meeting at home for obvious reasons." 

"Who else is on the call?"   Lyssa inquired already knowing the answer. 

Pretty much her entire department, including her new boss who had yet to start as well as the entire marine biodiversity staff, the preservation department and facilities.      The call was about the "Deadly Oceans traveling" exhibit that the Vienna Museum of Natural History had curated.  It would be arriving at NHM in 18 months at the museum had to start folding in California biology. Typically the exhibit space was never the same so they layout had to be designed and new displays had to be created.    

When the exhibit left the museum, some of the California/North America specific items would be going with it so it was important that if any real specimens were included they were ones that the museum could do without for nearly 3 years. 

Lyssa didn't really have a role especially since her new boss was a marine mammalogist.   

Lyssa continued to chat with Olivia while she waited for her food.  It was until she headed back to her office that a lightbulb went on in her brain.  Olivia typically had her meals delivered--she had a private elevator from the first floor to her office.   She must have come down because she was on the hunt for inefficiency or slacking staff. 

When Lyssa returned she found a note from her volunteer indicating that she had a class but would be back by 3:00 PM to continue her work. 

Lyssa used the time to go behind her make sure that cataloguing was being done correctly and that the barcodes matched up with sample batches she had selected in the lab.  So far so good. 

While she was reboxing some of the samples after determining the boxes were likely older than her volunteer she had a pressing thought that she would only stay at her parents on Saturday and Sunday.  On Monday she hoped to swing into Sacramento, spend the night then return to her parents by Wednesday she wanted to be on her way back to Los Angeles. 

She sighed realizing that Stephen wouldn't make it back until the weekend.   She was going to have to keep herself busy until then.