Fossil Hunter

by Robert J. Sawyer

  “Now!” shouted Galpook, negotiating her way around the wagons. The hunters she’d originally called upon burst toward the blackdeath’s rear and immediately leapt on the beast’s back. Galpook followed suit. There were six, now seven, now eight, now ten Quintaglios leaping onto the blackdeath’s spine, pommeling it with clenched fists, trying to drive the beast to its knees. The giant humped its backbone, trying to buck the Quintaglios, and one indeed did go flying, ending up lying dazed some distance away. But after a moment she got back to her feet and leapt again onto the back of the blackdeath. The giant staggered under the weight of ten adult Quintaglios. It moved in broad circles, stooped from the waist. The hunters continued to ride it, the setting sun glaring into their eyes each time the beast swung around. The blackdeath tottered, lurched, its torso heaving raggedly.

  Its head swung left and right, but the great sticky ball in its mouth was vexing it more than the members of the hunting pack, for it interfered with the beast’s breathing and was depriving it of its best weapon. At last it tipped forward, bringing its right leg up, in hopes of using footclaws to clear away the gunky sphere. Galpook and her team slammed their bodies against the great blackdeath in unison, and, at last, it flopped to the ground, a cloud of dust choking them all as it hit.

  The secondary team now swarmed in from its hiding place in the foothills, some fifty Quintaglio engineers and builders, a vast green tide flowing over the ruins of the temple, brandishing block and tackle. They threw nets laced with interlocking hooks that came together into a continuous web, half covering the monster.

  One of the Quintaglios forgot that the blackdeath’s arm puny only in comparison to its body, and Galpook watched in horror as the limb swung out, opening up the belly of a male engineer, his guts spilling like a sacrifice onto the stones of the Temple of Lubal.

  But the weight of the rest of the Quintaglios was enough to keep the blackdeath from regaining its feet. The Quintaglios were risking a territorial frenzy of their own, but naked fear of the giant hunter was enough to keep that in check for a short time. Soon the blackdeath was trussed up, its legs bound, thick leather cord wrapped around its arms and tail.

  Galpook herself stood in front of the beast’s muzzle: a blocky black shape, warty this close up, the size of Galpook’s own torso. She signaled for a pair of gloves to be brought to her, and when they arrived she put them on. They had holes at the fingertips allowing her claws to poke through.

  Terrified, she furtively brought her hands in toward the creature’s face, carefully pulling on the rounded edge of the sticky sap, which had oozed up and around the tip of the muzzle. She drew the sap away from the blackdeath’s giant, flaring nostrils, ensuring that it could breathe well for the long trip back to Capital City. The thing’s great black eyes stared at Galpook, and it made snorting sounds around the sticky gum.

  Although it took well into the night, illuminated by five bright, dancing moons, the blackdeath was eventually transferred onto a massive cart. Galpook’s people were able to round up three of their bossnoses to pull the cart; the other two were long gone.

  Most of the secondary team had to disperse as soon as they were no longer needed, for such prolonged close contact was putting nerves on edge. Many went off with some of Galpook’s hunters to try their hand at nocturnal tracking. Others simply chose their own paths back to the Capital.

  In the light of the semi-ten of moons, Galpook walked slowly beside the captured killer, its mountainous hide heaving as it breathed.

  She did not envy Dybo and the others. Not at all.

  Chapter 26

  Musings of The Watcher

  My time sense is malleable. If I scatter myself widely, signals between parts of myself take longer to travel. The delays are completely undetectable to me, of course. It simply seems as though the external universe has speeded up, since my senses are sampling it less frequently. Likewise, if I collapse myself into a smaller area, my thoughts are processed more quickly, and I see the external universe move by at a slower rate.

  I extruded a portion of my presence into the outer periphery of the Crucible system’s cometary halo, about one-fifth of a Crucible light-year from its sun. Mustering my gravitational influence, I nudged a cometary nucleus. It began to fall toward the inner solar system.

  The pace was indolent. It took 350,000 Crucible years for the comet to traverse the distance to the ninth planet’s orbit (that moon of the eighth planet had indeed broken free by now, as I’d thought it might). I spread myself thin, letting the years pass quickly.

  A short time into that long span, a sad although not unpredictable thing happened. The Jijaki, my only companions in a vast and empty universe, discovered energy sources they’d never dreamed of before. A war broke out. I called to them, begging them to stop, but a crazed individual in the principal language group launched a massive attack against those speaking a less common tongue, and, despite my entreaties from the sky, in a very short time the Jijaki had destroyed themselves, leveling their home world and their colonies. I mourn them to this day.

  From the orbit of the ninth planet, it would only take twenty-six years for the comet nucleus to reach the Crucible. By now, the comet was moving at a speed of about five kilometers per second. I contracted myself, slowing the apparent pace of time.

  With only forty percent of a single year left until the impact, the comet—now whipping along at eighteen kilometers per second—passed through the system’s asteroid belt.

  It crossed the orbit of the fourth planet, just nine percent of a year until impact. The reptiles and mammals on the Crucible doubtless saw it in the night sky, for its head now glowed and a diaphanous tail stretched behind it.

  I contracted, partly to savor every detail, partly to concentrate my meager gravitational influence to effect the required course corrections. The comet passed the orbit of the Crucible’s moon. Its speed was now thirty kilometers per second. Time to impact: one-eighth of one day.

  And then, and then, and then…

  Traveling at sixty-seven kilometers per second, it drilled through the Crucible’s atmosphere in less than two seconds, leaving a vacuum hole behind it.

  On impact, a lethal shock wave spread for twelve hundred kilometers from the crash site. The comet and much of the target material vaporized completely, electron shells stripped off to form a super-heated plasma. Much of it blew out the hole in the atmosphere, and, in a fraction of a day, enveloped the world above the stratosphere. The planet was plunged into darkness.

  In the atmosphere, nitrogen ignited, leading to strong nitric-acid rains.

  Forest fires raged across all the continents.

  Plant life died on land; photosynthetic plankton expired throughout the seas.

  The food chains collapsed.

  And, just as I had planned, in a very short time every land animal massing over twenty-five kilograms died, including every single one of the dinosaurs.

  The way was paved on the Crucible for the mammals.

  Capital City: Office of the Undertaker

  Gathgol was used to solitude. After all, he was an undertaker.

  People didn’t fear death—not exactly—but neither did they like to contemplate it. Being undertaker was a pretty good job. There were only seven thousand Quintaglios in all of Capital province, fully half of them here in Capital City. Gathgol’s services were rarely called for, although he did travel to wherever a death had occurred. More often than not, a death would happen on the hunt—a pack had foolishly gone after a meat-eater instead of a herbivore, or attacked a hornface from the front instead of the rear. In those cases, assuming the surviving hunters had been successful, Gathgol would get to dine on fresh meat before he bundled up the body for the trip to Prath.

  These days, though, Gathgol was not getting much solitude. Since the murder of Haldan, he had had many visitors to his small establishment in the holy quarter of town. Today, Sal-Afsan himself had come, along with his assistant, the lanky Pal-Cadool.

  “I
believe we can determine several things about the person who did the killing,” said Afsan without preamble. He groped for a stool. “For instance, to cut Haldan’s neck at the angle he or she did, he or she would have to be of a certain height. Isn’t that right, Gathgol?”

  There was no response.

  “Gathgol? Are you still here?”

  The undertaker found his voice. “Forgive me, Sal-Afsan. Yes, I’m still here. I’m sorry, it’s just I’m flabbergasted that a savant such as yourself would ask questions of me.”

  Afsan waved a hand in the direction Gathgol’s voice had come from. “You are the expert in matters of death, Gathgol. I am no savant in this area.”

  “Yes. No. I mean—”

  Afsan held up his palm. “Just answer the question as if it were posed by a child, a student. And call me ‘Afsan,’ please. The formal name is just adding to your discomfort, I’m sure.”

  “‘Afsan.’ But that’s what your intimates call you.”

  “Some of them call me ‘fathead,’” said Afsan, with a disarming wrinkle of his muzzle, “but the ones who like me call me ‘Afsan,’ yes.”

  “Afsan,” said Gathgol, trying the name on for size. Then, again, “Afsan.” There was wonder in Gathgol’s voice; evidently the undertaker had never expected such informality.

  “Yes, Gathgol. Now, if you could perhaps answer my question?”

  “I’m sorry. Of course. No one could do this while balancing on tippy-toe. Assuming the mirror was held like this—”

  “I can’t see you, Gathgol. Please describe what you mean.”

  “Sorry. I assume the mirror was held in both hands, outstretched. Doubtless the murderer was holding it by the intact part of the wooden frame, one hand on either side. The mirror was a heavy piece, and one hand would have been inadequate to steady it. The murderer must have lifted it over Haldan’s head, the broken, sharp edge facing in, then brought it down below her muzzle and sliced up into the neck. To do all that, and carve at the angle that was used, the murderer would have to be at least one hundred and eighty centipaces tall.”

  “At least sixteen kilodays old, then.”

  “Yes, although perhaps a kiloday older if a female. Don’t put too much credence on that, though—these are rough estimates.”

  “Sixteen kilodays is pretty young.”

  “It’s a pretty young age to die at, too,” said Gathgol, but he instantly regretted speaking the observation out loud. “I’m sorry, forgive me. But that was Haldan’s age, wasn’t it?”

  “Yes.”

  “A young adult,” said Gathgol. “More than old enough to have taken the pilgrimage, though.”

  “Would someone that age have enough arm reach to bring the glass over Haldan’s head?” asked Afsan.

  “Arm reach varies from individual to individual, of course. Um, if you’ll forgive my impudence of making an example of you, good Cadool, I’ll point out that you have a much greater reach than is normal for one your age. Your limbs are quite long. Could a person one hundred eighty centipaces tall have managed it if he or she was of average build? Yes, but there wouldn’t have been much clearance. Still, I found no cuts on the upper surface of Haldan’s muzzle, so it must have happened cleanly. And, of course, the killer could have been taller than one hundred eighty centipaces, and, therefore, older. One-eighty is simply the bottom end of the range.”

  “Wouldn’t Haldan have seen the glass passing in front of her eyes?” asked Afsan.

  “Of course,” said Gathgol. “And she probably swung her head around to look at the murderer. In fact, the swinging of her head, as much as the murderer’s swiping, would have been what carved the neck open. But as she was dying, Haldan would have seen the person who killed her.”

  They were silent for a moment.

  “What about the glass?” said Afsan.

  “As I said before, it was a mirror. Not a great one—the optical qualities weren’t all that good, judging by the fragments, and the metallic backing was uneven. Still, they don’t make mirrors here in Capital City; too much basalt, not enough quartz-rich sand. One that big would have likely been made in Chu’toolar, but merchants distribute many of them each kiloday.”

  “There’s no way to be more specific about where it came from?”

  “Not really,” said Gathgol. “At least, I can’t think of a way. The frame is unadorned; just plain wood.”

  “What kind of wood?”

  “It looks like hamadaja to me.”

  “Thunderbeast fodder,” observed Afsan. “Found in all eight provinces.”

  “Exactly.”

  “What about a manufacturer’s mark?”

  “If there was one on the glass or the frame, it’s not on any of the fragments we have.”

  “Perhaps Novato will have an idea,” offered Cadool. He turned to Gathgol and added, “She used to deal with glassworkers in making her far-seers.”

  “Of course,” said Gathgol. “The mirror was incomplete. A large hunk was used to do the killing, and after the deed was done it was dropped on the tabletop, and shattered, but the whole thing wasn’t brought to Haldan’s apartment.”

  “And no one heard the sound of breaking glass?” asked Afsan.

  “The walls of Haldan’s apartment were thick, of course,” said Gathgol. “You couldn’t have noise leaking from one apartment to the next without creating territorial tensions. Forgive me, but even your own calls for help wouldn’t have been heard if you hadn’t left the main door open behind you. And, of course, the crime took place during the middle of the day; very few people would have been home then, I’d warrant.”

  Afsan nodded. “Do you know how much of the mirror is missing?”

  “Well, if it were just squared off, not that much. But most household mirrors are twice as tall as they are long. I’d suspect there’s at least as much missing as we have here. The wooden frame was cut with a saw, but the glass was broken more roughly.”

  “All we have to do, then, is find a person who remembers seeing someone carrying a mirror that day,” said Cadool. “Or better yet, half a mirror.”

  “I wish it were that simple,” said Gathgol. “But we also found a leather drop-sheet in Haldan’s apartment. It’s creased and scored in such a way that it’s pretty clear that the mirror was wrapped in it when brought into the apartment. The sight of someone carrying something wrapped in dark leather is not at all uncommon, I’m afraid. I’d doubt if anyone would have noticed.”

  “That is unfortunate,” said Afsan.

  They were all silent for a time.

  “Afsan,” said Gathgol at last, still sounding a bit uncomfortable with the short name.

  “Yes?”

  “Forgive me, but it seems the most likely method for finding the murderer is to figure out who would want to kill Haldan.”

  “Indeed,” said Afsan. “But why would anyone kill another person?”

  “You really don’t know, do you?” said Gathgol.

  “No, I don’t.”

  “There have been murders in the past,” said Gathgol. “They’re not common, not at all, but they do happen. And the killer always has a reason.”

  “What sort of reason?”

  “Well, in the old accounts, the reasons are usually pretty much the same. One kills another to possess something the other has, to prevent the other from revealing something the first one wants to remain secret, or out of fear.”

  “Fear?”

  “Yes,” said Gathgol. “One kills someone because one is afraid of that someone; afraid that that someone might kill or otherwise harm them.”

  Afsan’s tail swished left and right. “Who could possibly fear my daughter?”

  “Who indeed?” said Gathgol.

  Chapter 27

  The south pole

  Two shore boats were lowered from the side of the Dasheter and rowed in toward the ice. One carried Delplas, Biltog, and giant Var-Keenir; the other, Babnol, Spalton, and Toroca. Although Toroca wasn’t actually going to take part i
n the hunt, he had decided to come along to observe whatever animal the others tracked down.

  Between the first excursion onto the cap and this one, special anchors had been fashioned for the shore boats: metal hooks on long tethers that could be sunk into the ice. The ships were anchored and the six Quintaglios disembarked.

  The temperature was about fourteen degrees below zero, according to Keenir. The snow covering the ice was hard and crisp. No one quite knew how snow was formed. It melted into what seemed to be ordinary water if you held it in your hands, but it was different in texture from the clear ice that underlay it, and, in places, it was loose enough to blow like powder in the air.

  All six were wearing their stuffed leather jackets and snow pants, plus wide-soled shoes. Captain Keenir himself was going to lead the hunt. In the hunter’s sign language, each finger represented a different member of the team. So that he could communicate with his pack, Keenir took off his left mitten and tossed it into a shore boat, bobbing in the chilled gray water.

  They’d waited until late afternoon before coming here. The sun was low enough that the glare of its light off the snow wasn’t quite blinding now.

  Keenir gestured with his naked hand and the six of them began walking in from the shore. Where the ground was covered with snow, traction was reasonably good, although the going was slow because here their feet sank in. But where the ground was icy, walking was treacherous, and Toroca found his legs going out from underneath him on several occasions.

  The white ground undulated—not so much so that one would refer to the terrain as having hills and valleys, but enough that whatever was up ahead was often invisible until they were almost upon it. The pack came across a hole in the ice, with perhaps a hundred divers languishing around it. The sight of the hole, with water visible through it, gave Toroca pause. There wasn’t solid ground beneath them, just a layer of ice that varied wildly in thickness from place to place. Here it was perhaps thick enough to support the weight of divers, but possibly not strong enough in all places to hold up adult Quintaglios. Although the air itself wasn’t devastatingly cold, the water was so icy as to be dangerous indeed. Two days before, Spalton had slipped when getting into a shore boat and fallen into the water. He’d turned white from head to tail; Toroca had thought he was going to die.