Part One b - Cutting into the cold hard flesh of a human

[Cearlan]

The hair is semi translucent with a pearlescent sheen to it. It feels oily to the touch and smells of fish, rotten meat and salt combined, more strongly of the decaying flesh than aught else. Even after the samples are removed from the bag - the odour still lingers. Where there are roots on the end of the hairs it shows that the follicles to be about twice the size of a normal human hair. Balzac's notes will reflect this, (assume he gets a hair with a follicle attached).

OOC:   Luck roll please Diana - to see if you can manage to get a small blood sample suitable for microscopic examination. Failure means that it is too decayed by time and the weather or you have a case of sausage-finger.

[Mr. Handy]

Diana is in luck. The sample she has retrieved is adequate for analysis.

OOC,[b]Diana[/b]'s Luck roll (55% stat) to get a good sample. [dice]0[/dice]

[andyw666]

"Merci Madame." Balzac wrinkles the large Gallic noise at the smell of the hair but draws and annotates diligently with the aid of the little magnifying loupe.

"Ugh. This reminds me why I prefer le botanie. I shall need a fresh pot of café after this."

[Mr. Handy]

"Your quite welcome," says Diana, "and I empathize completely. I would much rather smell flowers any day. There are some plants that are malodorous, but nothing like this! How can these creatures stand being around each other, let alone themselves?"

[Cearlan]

Examining the small sample you have managed to extract from the follicles you are struck by the fact that the blood is not at all similar to human blood. Instead of the flat plates, normally associated with blood, these were rough tetrahedrons.

[Mr. Handy]

"Curious," says Diana as she peers into the microscope with her other eye shut. "This blood isn't like human blood, or the blood of any known animal for that matter. The red cells aren't flat plates, they look more like tetrahedra."

[andyw666]

"Merde!"

"Hairy, smelly, violent and with blood comprised four sided cells. Reminds me of a young lady of my - ah - acquaintance back in my days at the Universitie."

Once his notes are finished, Balzac heads off to make more coffee then find somewhere to practise jazz on his trumpet. Somewhere that won't drive his colleagues insane.

[Mr. Handy]

"The first three, perhaps, Doctor," says Diana, "but I seriously doubt the mademoiselle had blood like this. Nothing else does, that I know of at least. This is a tremendous find! Someone should do a chemical analysis of it."

[NFVD]

"Diana is correct." says Dr. Newton, "I could check my books but I am very sure blood cells with this configuration are unknown to current medical science. Of the top of my head I cannot recall any Phylum that even remotely resembles this. Whatever we have here points to a development that went a different way from all other Fauna on Earth that has been catalogued...maybe a living fossil? An old branch from the Tree of Life that has endured only here for ages_ Or that only developed here in the first place? We should certainly see what chemistry can tell us about these cells, but that area is not my forte. I believe our geologists are the most proficient chemists available at the moment."

[Mr. Handy]

"Yes, Mr. Fyll would be well suited to the task," says Diana.

[Cearlan]

The post-mortem on the second body yields similar results to the first other than the torn off hand, the hole through the chest cavity and the increased level of violence used on the body being the only differing factors along with the fibrous material currently being analysed by Balzac and Diana.

[Mr. Handy]

Diana tries examining one of the fibrous hairs, if that's what they are, under the microscope to get more detail.