The Mystery of the Button Man

[EricW]

What kind of story would appear in the news, if a crazed cultist went around murdering people and building strange stone idols in the woods?

Maybe Something like the following;

The 'Button Man' could be key to mounting mountain mystery

In recent years there have been experienced hunters, well-equipped bushwalkers, campers and day trippers who have disappeared without trace.

With no concrete evidence of what happened, it is perhaps natural that rumours fill the void.

...

And it is why locals in the area speculate about a regular visitor who disappears into the mountains for months at a time known as Buttons or The Button-Man.

He is a flint-hard, expert bushman who earned his nickname from his habit of using deer antlers to make buttons and fashion large plugs for his ear piercings.

He has made a camp on the side of a remote mountain that lets him see anyone approaching, uses snares to catch deer and hunts with expertly crafted Indigenous-style spears.

Many campers and hunters have stories of the Button-Man emerging from the dark and approaching them at campsites. He is described as around 70, with short grey hair, wearing dark jackets and "bloody scary". Others say he is “spooky”, but no one reports any threats or violence.

...
 

 

 

[alter]

This is perfect as Delta Green op. 

Edited May 24, 2020 by alter

[EricW]

1 hour ago, alter said:

This is perfect as Delta Green op. 

Yep - and its the genuine article, in terms of being a real mystery published in a real newspaper.

I doubt the button man if he exists has genuine magical powers, but he might well be insane. The extensive Victorian highlands region is notorious for dangerously unpredictable weather, people who really value their privacy, lawlessness, unexplained disappearances and hippies who went off the deep end, ate one local mushroom too many.

Strange place, at once accessible yet largely unexplored, at least by people who cared to share news of what they found.

Stick to the path and you will most likely just have a pleasant walk in the bush. But stray from the path, and you might never be seen again.

Edited May 24, 2020 by EricW

[MOB]

I've been camping up that way, in the Victorian high country. This is the bit of the newspaper article that creeped me out the most: "They say no one knows he is near until he decides to make himself known. A wildlife photographer spent days taking shots in the area near the Button-Man’s camp. When he returned home and downloaded his photos to his computer there was one unexplained shot of the photographer asleep inside his tent. No one knows who took the shot."

[EricW]

21 hours ago, MOB said:

I've been camping up that way, in the Victorian high country. This is the bit of the newspaper article that creeped me out the most: "They say no one knows he is near until he decides to make himself known. A wildlife photographer spent days taking shots in the area near the Button-Man’s camp. When he returned home and downloaded his photos to his computer there was one unexplained shot of the photographer asleep inside his tent. No one knows who took the shot."

A lot of the woodlands are typical Aussie forest, but some of the woodlands are really dark and dense, enormous towering trees blocking all the light. Last time we stayed in one of the darker wetter woodlands it snowed in the middle of Summer. Huge spiders absolutely everywhere in the darker woods, bigger than your hand, lurking, watching you. Wombats rustling and crunching in the undergrowth at all hours, but mostly at night. The animals in the remoter regions are unused to the presence of people. You shine your light out in the pitch black night and all you can see is the reflection of hundreds of eyes.

And now we know, just maybe, one set of those eyes glittering in the night belongs to the Button Man.

Edited May 25, 2020 by EricW