Killing Rhinos

by Herb Hughes

  Herb Hughes

  Books From The Pond

  2017

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, places, organizations, events and incidents are either the products of the author’s imagination or used in a fictitious manner. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental.

  Copyright © 2017 by Herb Hughes

  All rights reserved. This book or any portion thereof may not be reproduced or used in any manner whatsoever without the express written permission of the publisher except for the use of brief quotations in a book review or scholarly journal.

  First Printing: 2017

  ISBN-13: 978-1547254859

  ISBN-10: 1547254858

  Books From The Pond

  1207 E. Forrest St., Ste. D-105

  Athens AL 35613

  www.herbhughesnovels.com

  Cover art: Mutt Suttles

  Map of Agrilot:Drawing – Jack Wheat

  Background – Mutt Suttles

  Once again, I dedicate this book to the person who makes life worth living: To Charlotte. Thank you for sharing this and everything else with me. Perhaps a beer on the patio tonight?

  and

  To Kathy. Thank you for helping. I will always remember you.

  Chapter 1

  The electronic scope had long since quit working. The man sighted along the side of the short barrel, steadied his hands in the cradle formed by the rocks, and slowly squeezed the trigger. With a gentle hum, a vivid blue beam leaped toward the target, piercing flesh close to the intended point. He held his aim for the better part of a second. He didn’t want to make too big a bloody mess, but he had to keep the beam on long enough to pierce the tough skin and thick chest, only a fraction of a second, but the right fraction of a second. If he didn’t, well, it was kill or be killed. Failure meant he would be the bloody mess.

  With lightning reflexes, the Rhino’s head snapped around, an ugly face contorted in a horrified expression of surprise and pain. A burst of red, a momentary cloud of vapor, temporarily opaqued the air on the other side of the Rhino. A gushing crimson stream quickly followed, squirting into the air and staining the hard yellow dirt of the desert floor where it splashed and splattered. The man had held the trigger down only the slightest slice of a second too long, and the laser had carved through a major artery. Burn-through had come fast, too fast. The red stain extended onto the crusty desert for ten meters. Cover up was going to be tough.

  The huge animal stayed on wobbly legs one second then two, but that was all. It dropped to the ground with a heavy thud, the impact of the massive body reverberating through the earth. Standing behind a rock on a small rise overlooking the desert floor, the man could feel the ground quiver through his boots. He quickly collapsed the telescoping barrel and folded the thin rails that made up the laser rifle’s stock, reducing the weapon to storage size, not much more than a man's hand. It slid neatly into a hidden compartment carved in the underside of his saddle.

  Climbing up on the saddle, he reached to rub his horse’s right ear, but there was no need. Killer, understanding that the man could not afford to waste time, had already started down the slope. Horse and rider moved quickly. Though he was far from civilization, you never knew. As unlikely as it seemed, spying eyes might be about.

  Once on the desert floor, the man pulled gently on the reins and approached the bloody body slowly, creeping up ever so carefully until he could see the animal's eyes. There were no tiny flickers of white light in them, which would mean the beast was still breathing. The animal appeared to be dead, but there was no sense taking chances. He needed to get a closer look. Cautiously, he allowed Killer to inch toward the massive body that lay as still as a desert rock. Silence reigned. When he was near enough to see both huge eyes full-on, there was only the dull, dark gray that spoke of death, the same hollow darkness he had seen so many times before.

  The horn – the prize – would come first. When he was sure there was not one white dot left in the eyes, the man pulled a folding ruler from his saddlebag, dismounted, and knelt over the beast's head then measured the large center horn. Fifty-eight and a half centimeters. Not bad. Not a record by any means, but not bad at all.

  He pulled a small hand saw from his saddle pack and started cutting at the horn's base, directly against the skull to save as much length as possible. Once removed, he carefully wrapped the horn in damp leather then greased the outside with animal fat. A final wrap of dry leather completed the package. Keeping the horn wet would avoid the shrinkage that came with drying. On a good-sized horn over a several-day trip, this would save as much as four or five millimeters length at measuring time. It was a trick that few Rhino hunters knew. After all, they didn't share secrets. The better Rhino hunters didn’t. And those in the bottom echelon knew few secrets to share. He carefully placed the treasure in his saddlebag.

  With the trail of misted blood stretching so far across the desert landscape, it was all too obvious that the Rhino had been killed with a laser. No homebuilt could have caused an artery to explode so violently. Removing the blood stains from the yellow dirt and leaving the desert looking natural and undisturbed would not be easy. He knew it would take at least an hour to painstakingly gather and bury the spoiled dirt, brush the surface to a weathered smoothness, and carefully place pebbles, stones, and rocks in a random pattern.

  No help for it. With the touch and care of a god creating a small world, he went about the work diligently. When he was finished, it had taken well over an hour, but the result was as natural as any of the surrounding desert.

  After cleanup, he was ready to fire his homebuilt. The noise of a gunshot would carry for several kilometers in the desert, so it was always the last thing he did.

  He stared at the dead creature for a moment. At three and a half meters long and two high, it had the body and tail of an oversized bull. The animal's head was huge, almost the size of a man’s body. The eyes were bright and fiery when alive; burning red and orange and yellow and flickering wildly as if lit from within. The tremendous size of the animal, the ugly, menacing face and the brightly burning eyes, made a fearful sight, one that had been known to cause men’s hearts to fail even before the Rhino leaped forward to rip them to shreds. They were the lucky ones.

  As a Rhino lay dying the brightly-colored flicker in its eyes turned to a wavering white, slowed to a few moving dots, then finally turned to the strange dark, hollow appearance that spoke of death. The dull, dark hollow eyes were so much better than the flickering, fiery eyes. The creatures scared him. They scared everyone.

  In the middle of the top of the animal's head, there were three sharp-pointed horns, the small upper and lower spikes and the large, slightly curving center horn. The center horn had serrated edges, top and bottom, that could slide through human flesh as easy as carving warm butter.

  Staring at the red-gray gap where the large horn had been, he wondered why the beasts were called Rhinos. The dead animal on the ground in front of him did not look like a rhinoceros, and, from what he had read in the books in the library, a rhinoceros was as tame as a dead cat compared to a Rhino. But Rhinos they had always been called. He supposed it was the horns then let the thought go. The cover-up needed to be finished.

  With burn-through, the beam exited the opposite side of the creature, so there were two round laser holes in the Rhino’s hide, both neat and precise. This made cover-up more complicated. You could make the entrance wound look like a ragged homebuilt hole by lining up and firing the homebuilt at the hole. But now he would have to deal with the exit wound as well, make it look as though the ball came out the opposite side. That was dubious because of the massiveness of the creature. If you put enough powder in a homebuilt to go
through a Rhino of this size, you would likely split the barrel. And break your shoulder from the recoil. But it couldn't be helped. The damage was done. Hopefully, nobody would see this one before the flesh was so badly rotted they wouldn’t want to go poking around in it.

  The man took his knife and went all the way around the exit wound, making the edges ragged instead of neat. Then he made a few rough cuts so that short, tattered strips of tough hide lay outward, as though pushed out by the force of a ball.

  Walking to the other side of the animal, he plucked four of the beast’s stiff hairs then laid them as the four points of an exploded cross, so that the point where the four hairs pointed marked the center of the entrance wound. Then he placed a small strip of thin leather over the wound to avoid getting powder burns on the animal's skin. Carefully adjusting the leather in relation to the four hairs, he knew exactly where the laser hole was. Later, the four long, stiff hairs and the powder-burned strip of leather would be buried somewhere along the trip. With a delicate touch, he aimed the homebuilt and squeezed the trigger.

  The flesh immediately around the wound jumped slightly with the force of the shot as the roar of the homebuilt echoed back and forth around the desert, but the rest of the animal's body was motionless. He had used only a quarter load of gunpowder. No sense making the ball go too deep.

  With long, thin metal tongs the man had forged himself, he suffered the animal’s terrible stench as he dug into the wound to retrieve the ball and the leather strip. After all, the shot was supposed to have gone all the way through so he couldn’t leave the ball inside. He was probably being too careful. Hell, he thought, who's going to dig through the wound of a dead, stinking Rhino, anyway. But he didn't like leaving things to chance. He wasn't nearing the all-time record because he was a careless man.

  After almost a minute of digging into the rank purple flesh, while suffering the nausea caused by the odor, the ball was retrieved. He cleaned and put away the tongs, mounted Killer, and then turned for the oasis, more than a day’s ride to the east. Borderton, home if the man could be said to have a home, was another day beyond. The man patted the saddlebag where the large horn was carefully stored. This prize made one hundred nine. Close to the record, but, at the same time, still a long way to go. It would take years yet... if he managed to stay alive.

  The height and location of the sun told him that noon was hours passed. Getting late. He would have to hurry. It was an hour to the Spine and a half-hour or more to find the narrow opening and work his and Killer’s way through the ancient ruin. By then it would be close to dark and time to camp alone in the desert for one more night. Having the Spine at his back would offer some protection in the black desert night, on the off chance another Rhino emerged from the earth. Fortunately, the creatures were rare enough.

  After a night’s sleep, it would take another full day’s ride to reach the oasis. Not an easy ride, either. The hours would seem endless as he traveled east through the unchanging, rugged rock and sand landscape toward the pool of water that bubbled up from the bowels of the earth. It was such a vast sameness that, if he wasn’t careful, he could veer off and miss the oasis altogether. Even if he didn’t, he would be lucky to make the oasis by dark tomorrow. After a night at the oasis, one more day through a terrain that slowly changed from desert to farmland then, finally, home.

  The man rubbed Killer’s right ear, the request to quicken the pace. The horse reared his head to show agreement then lengthened his step. Killer was smart, very smart. The man had taken to him more quickly than any horse he had ever owned. When they first came together, four years ago, the man discovered immediately that Killer was not to be commanded, not to be ordered or herded about like a cow. When he wanted the horse to do something, he requested it. Once that was understood, it only took a few weeks to work out a series of signals. They had ridden together in perfect harmony ever since. Killer, in fact, seemed to read the man’s mind at times. The horse knew the routine so well there was rarely a need for a request anymore.

  Some distance later they passed the Rhino hole, the earthen womb from which the beast had emerged. The ground had been gutted deeply with the edges of the hole ripped and ragged. All sizes and shapes of clumps of dirt and rock were strewn about randomly. He was lucky to have caught this one before it got too far, before it reached a town and the people living there.

  Chapter 2

  “Dust, dust, and more dust. Squantum, squintum, reasy, rahsy, rooh. They are all piles of dust. Ninety-eight point two-four cubed is nine hundred forty-eight thousand one hundred twenty-three point eighty-three… Almost.

  “Ah! Good evening, lovely self. How is the weather today? Perhaps a storm? Sweet rain to wash the dust away, away, away?

  “What’s that you say dreadful self? A storm? The weather cannot get inside. Oh, no matter. The dust has settled. All the little piles of dust are crumbled, dried, and settled to the floor. All the little piles of dust. You and I are the last, of course. And you, insignificant self, are unworthy of even that dubious honor.

  “Yes, oh wondrous self. Dum, doo, dee. Flowers tied to a scooty’s head; a child will laugh when it jumps in bed... I miss the dreams so. The world was so beautiful. Now, one day far too soon I will be dust. Oh, the imperfection of it all, the ghastly, unsympathetic imperfection of it all. Three thousand and six times seven hundred thirty-nine is two million two hundred twenty-one thousand four hundred thirty-four. Oh! Have you returned, exalted self? My, it is good to see you. It gets so very lonely here. Yes, yes, all dust. Dust, dust, dust. The dust piles sit there. No one tends to them. It is so very lonely when you are not here. What was that, honored self? There is no one? Oh, but you are wrong of course. You are here. And so am I.”

  Chapter 3

  He was on foot now, holding Killer’s reins and walking ahead. As evening struggled to dim the sun, he led his horse toward the group of trees that would mark the oasis and water. Moving to the side from time-to-time to miss a scrub tree, feet and hooves plodded along on hard ground, scattering pebbles and rocks. The small trees of the desert were well below knee height and, though warped and twisted by the relentless winds of evening, were hard and stiff and hurt like hell when you accidentally stumbled into one. Avoiding them was standard procedure.

  It had been well over a day since the kill. The man had slept on the desert floor the night before, barely enough rest to give him strength to ride all day. He was tired, and he knew Killer was tired, but the horse tried not to show it.

  When darkness was close to conquering the sky, he could make out fronds silhouetted against the dark red and gold horizon, some distance to the east. The sky behind him remained blue, but the blue was edging toward purple, and the sun could no longer be seen on the western horizon. He turned and circled north for a few hundred meters, concentric to the oasis, to make sure he approached at a slightly different angle. The desert floor was hard and the light tracks he and Killer made would quickly be erased by the evening winds. When he finished circling and turned back toward the landmark that offered water and the feel of shelter, sunset had passed, and the breeze stiffened. It was night.

  There were two small campfires, both burning with the brightness that told of being newly lit. Winds whipped the flames violently. The trunks of the trees growing in the oasis were thin lines of wavy brown where the inner sides were lighted by the dancing glow.

  The flames were not tall. Firewood was a rare and precious commodity in the desert. Still, travelers believed campfires were essential. It was generally accepted that Rhinos did not attack anyone close to a fire, so each person would have brought several logs from the forest around Borderton, a good day’s ride to the east.

  Nothing but folklore. The man had seen plenty of evidence to indicate Rhinos were not afraid of fire. The reason people were safe at night, he believed, was that Rhinos did not emerge in the dark. They usually came out of the ground in the morning, as the sun warmed the earth. Most of them were killed before nightfall. That was
the only reason people were safer at night. But old fears and old beliefs don’t go away easily. While others had listened to his observations intently and nodded understanding, they still lit their fires at night when traveling.

  Of course, if you did happen to run across a Rhino at night, you could pretty much count on having your ticket punched for six feet under. A black animal against a black sky was almost impossible to shoot even if its eyes were flaming brightly, but a Rhino could see with those bright, flickering eyes as well as if it were day. And maybe the campfires did that much, allowing travelers some vision, limited though it was.

  The few tall, thin, frond-crowned trees that lined almost every oasis were safe from pillage for firewood. The trunk of an oasis tree was a strong, lightweight, fibrous material that held many times its weight in water, assuring the tree’s survival in the harsh environment. The logs would not burn unless dried for several days. Once dry, they burned like paper, bright and quick, proving unworthy for keeping bodies warm on long, cold nights. Left alone they provided shade, limited though it was, from the harsh desert sun.

  As he neared the oasis, he remounted, letting Killer amble slowly toward the flames of the campfires. The chatter of conversation grew louder. A few more meters and he was able to pick out Greg Bonner's voice, then Sam Crusher's. Both were Rhino hunters. Greg was a mean son-of-a-bitch and a good Rhino hunter, too damned good. Sam was no competition at all.

  Suddenly Crazy Mac's high-pitched whine pierced the night. The old man was raving about something, and the others were laughing, as much at him as at what he was saying, no doubt. The man knew Crazy Mac was not trying to be funny. He rarely was. But people always laughed, until they became tired of hearing the stories of how it used to be in the old days and why things are like they are now and all the other nonsense the old coot spouted forth like an eternal spring.