Bisaan or Bisan is a Malayan cicada spirit.
Characteristics
Bisaan were said to have originated in the forests of Malaysia and are very rare in America. In their true forms they have no genitalia as a result they emerge from underground every 27 years and possess humans through the mouth, so they can mate and breed.
The larva in a human female.
While possessing a human the host will take on a pale appearance with pointed, thorn-like teeth, green glowing eyes, and eventually a total lack of genitalia. Like real cicadas, they tend to chitter as a "mating call". After mating, the pregnant females are taken back to their burrow where they eventually die. The next generation of larval bisaan gestate in their wombs for another 27 years before hatching.
The cycle of Bisaan mating became an urban legend in the town of Gunnison, Colorado. According to Etta Day, once a generation people in town would go nuts, having orgies and copulating in the woods. They would be so consumed with lust that their eyes would shine like emeralds. Etta's grandmother called it "the chitters" as there was much "buzzing and rattling" heard from the woods during the orgies. Afterwards they would disappear, never to be heard from again.
History
At some point, a pack of bisaan settled into the woods around Gunnison, Colorado and became known as myth to the locals called "the chitters" due to the noises they made. The bisaan emerged from the woods, kidnapped people and reproduced for the first known time in 1962.
In 1989, the bisaan emerged again and kidnapped a dozen people for their activities. One of the people they took was Matty Cuevas while he was walking in the woods with his brother Jesse. No one believed Jesse's story about what had happened to his brother and he grew bitter and left the town because of this and the fact that people hated him for being gay. During this cycle, the local sheriff managed to track down the bisaan lair, but one of the people they possessed was his own daughter and he was forced to kill her. Wanting to hide his actions and believing the bisaan to be dying off, the sheriff covered up his actions and let people believe their loved ones had just run off.
In 2016, the bisaan emerged again and took six people, drawing the attention of hunters Sam and Dean Winchester. Jesse, having become a hunter, returned with his husband Cesar to get revenge. The bisaan lair is eventually tracked down by Cesar and Dean who find the females of the species pregnant already and ready to go into hibernation. The two hunters kill the surviving bisaan and then Jesse burns their lair, killing the unborn bisaan. The hunters are able to locate the bodies of the bisaan victims and burn them as well with Jesse giving his brother a Hunter's Funeral.
Power and Abilities
A human being dragged by a Bisaan.
- Super Strength - They have standard physical strength like common creatures.
- Possession - Bisaan can possess people by entering through the mouth and essentially uses the human body as a shell.
- Reproduction - As Bisaan have no genitalia, they use human bodies to reproduce.
- Fangs - The Bisaan possess pointed teeth to defend themselves.
Weaknesses
Bisaan larva
- Decapitation - Cutting off a Bisaan's head will kill them.
- Fire - Burning the Bisaan's eggs destroyed them.
- Sage - Burning sage will produce a scent to repel them.
- Short Life-Span - A Bisaan has a short life-span of a few days from hatching until death, needing to mate within that time to continue their species.
Lore
Bisaan in lore
The bisan is a cicada spirit from Jakun (Old-Malayans in Malaysia) myth, thought to protect the camphor trees.
The word "bisan" has a wide array of meanings, including "camphor spirit", "woman", "bird", "cat", "marriage", "humankind", "fowl", "mother", "widow", "child", and "musket-ball", so it is difficult to assign a singular idea to it. However, the spirit itself is most often depicted as a beautiful woman. Bisan are also thought to take the form of cicadas.
As the guardians of camphor trees, when people enter the forest to search for camphor, bisan will be there every step of the way to keep them from it. However, it is still possible to obtain it through a combination of trickery and appeasement. Anyone who goes on these season-long camphor hunts must speak the Patang Kipur, or camphor language, which is a combination of Malay and Jakun words spoken backwards or otherwise altered. The bisan are said to understand both of the base languages, so unless the humans speak the Patang Kipur they will be alerted to the hunters' intention and seek to defend the trees. Those that stay behind in the village must also speak this language when referring to the search to further keep the bisan from growing suspicious.
In addition, camphor gatherers will throw a portion of their food into the undergrowth as an offering, but bisan are picky. The gatherers do not have to offer prayer, but they must eat their food dry, with no stewed vegetables or fish. It is also considered good practice to not salt the food with ground-up salt: the coarser the salt they use, the larger the camphor grains will be.
Despite the inconveniences the bisan present, they also lead the gatherers to their quarry with their song. At night, bisan will sing, a sure sign that camphor trees are near. However, they will not sing on rainy nights.
In the real lore, the Bisaan is Benevolent spirit. However, in Supernatural, their role reversed.
Trivia
- Bisaan are one of the only supernatural creatures who are mortals.
- Technically, Bisaan are the second Southern Asian mystic creatures depicted in Supernatural, after the Filipino Aswang.
- The Bisaan also shared similar characteristics as the Aswang in terms of their unique strategies of reproduction.
- The picture on the website used by Jessy and Cesar is the picture of a Wayang Kulit character named Arjuna, who is depicted as a protagonist in most Wayang Kulit plays. UNESCO designated wayang kulit, a shadow puppet theatre and the best known of the many different kinds of Indonesian wayang puppet plays, as a Masterpiece of Oral and Intangible Heritage of Humanity on 7 November 2003. In return for the acknowledgment, UNESCO required Indonesians to preserve their heritage.