Rerun Article: Monster Hoax or Truly Beast?

The Saber-Toothed Assassin (top), was supposedly seen last Tuesday night by Mac Dee Dee who's meat crate it ripped open (bottom).

You might recall that in the past, we've written on some strange creature sightings in the past (e.g. The Great Pumpkin and a strange weasel-like mammal), and for the past few months, Riverville has been sort of quiet in this department because we haven't had any strange creature sightings . . . until last Tuesday night. Just when we thought all was quiet, another one of these unidentified creatures, known as “cryptids”, makes its presence known at Mac Dee Dee's Farm, the same farm that opened just a few weeks ago. When a cryptid was sighted at the farm, my trusty, junior photographer, Daniel P. Smithwater and I went over to the farm to get an interview with the farm's owner, Mac Dee Dee. “It was about 10:00 p.m. and I was sitting in my office about to go lie down for some shuteye,” says Mac Dee Dee, “when I looked up at the computer monitor that was connected to the security camera's we have outside and I just barely noticed a large creature run through the woods near the place I keep one of my tractor containment crates.” Mac Dee Dee went on to explain that inside the crate was a refrigerated compartment for holding fresh cow meat that was going to be shipped off the following day. Mac Dee Dee was quoted for saying, “But now I can't ship any of that meat off because that creature, whatever it was, clawed it open. It didn't bother to try eating the meat however, I'm not sure why. But just before it left, a pressed the 'snap photo' button on the security camera program and got a good picture of the beast.” Mac Dee Dee explained that his security camera system didn't save video footage, otherwise he would have taken a gotten a video clip of the beast. When I asked to see the photo, he showed it to me. The creature was unlike any wild creature I'd seen before. It was a four-legged, rhino-sized predator with a pair of saber-teeth protruding from its mouth, much like a saber-toothed cat. But this wasn't a cat, in fact, it wasn't even a mammal, but a reptile by the looks of it. Then Mac Dee Dee took us to see the crate the predator had torn through. True to his word, the animal's sharp claws tore right through it and due to the possibility of contamination, Mac Dee Dee had to loose his meats. With Mac Dee Dee's permission, I took the photo to Dr. Samuel Adamson, a head paleontologist at Animal Adventures Institute to see if he could identify the creature for me (I went to him instead of a zoologist because I thought this might be an animal believed to be extinct). He is quoted for saying, “I'm not exactly sure, but this cryptid is, but it looks a great deal like the Permian reptile known as a gorgonopsid. Depending on the species, a gorgonopsid could be the size of a small dog, to the size of a rhinoceros in the case of a species such as Gorgonops and Inostrancevia. But what all gorgonopsids had in common was a pair of saber-teeth that protruded from the top of the jaw.” As you might recall, the head geneticist of Animal Adventures Institute, Dr. Steve Stevenson, has successfully cloned a gorgonopsid named Gordon, but she's assured me that she's not the one responsible for tearing into Mac Dee Dee's meat crate. “I was sleeping like a baby at 10pm on Tuesday night,” she says. “Ask anyone here at the [Animal Adventures] Studios and they'll tell you the same. Besides, if I did sneak out and run to Mac Dee Dee's farm, security would have spotted me.” So with this new cryptid sighting making all the main local news outlets, it's guaranteed that this creature – now being affectionately referred to as “The Saber-Toothed Assassin” by some – is bound to attract some monster hunters, hoping to prove its existence. We may not know if this creature's a hoax or a real animal, but perhaps 21^st century technology will help track this monster down before it causes too much trouble, but if its anything like the famous cryptids such as Big Foot, Loch Ness Monster and the Yeti, we could be searching for the Saber-Toothed Assassin for some time to come . . . let's hope it doesn't turn up in my backyard!

Written by: Mr. Smiley

Photographer: Daniel P. Smithwater

Edited by: Christian Ryan and Joy Hammond

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Next Issue: Dr. Samuel Adamson's Fossil Discovery Report for 2015