by Brian King
“I’m happy to see you safe, Sheela,” I said while she stood in front of me.
“I am happy to see you, too. Thank you for watching out for me.” The glow in her eyes was gone, but her feline smile reinforced her words.
More roars echoed from outside, and we all froze to listen. Sheela moved the instant it stopped and went right to the tree barrier with her spear in hand.
“They seem to be calling to each other,” Sheela volunteered after a few moments of peering through the branches of the tree protecting our entrance.
“Or they’re looking for something,” I replied. I took off my hat and wiped my brow while also forcing my heart rate back down to normal. The pause helped me think.
“So, what the hell are they? Did they follow you? Are you hurt?” I tried to think of all the questions a good leader would ask. The beasts sounded a lot like the apex predator that chased us from the lake.
“It was a giant dinosaur, with an ugly head, short arms, and a long lizard tail,” Sheela said while getting close to catching her breath. “I would guess it to be fifteen feet tall with teeth more vicious than anything we have seen.”
She'd killed the massive crocodile who tried to eat me, so the thought of Sheela being scared of another dinosaur gave me a tremor of fear. Had she seen a T-Rex? I didn't know a ton about dinosaurs, but I recalled them being a lot taller than twelve feet. Then again, the T-Rex wasn't the only predator in dinosaur times. There might be thousands of smaller or even larger predator species.
“Were they after you?” I asked in an anxious voice. I hated the thought of something hunting my friend.
“No,” Sheela replied. “I hid inside the giant fallen tree while it walked down the stream. It did double back like it found a scent, but it eventually went away. I took a long way back to the cave, intending to lessen the chance it would pick up my trail. However, I passed near a second beast that was very similar to the first. It seemed to pursue its friend.” She was already calmer than I was despite having seen two of the bastards.
“Were they working together?” I asked. “Maybe they were mates?”
“Perhaps,” Sheela replied as she momentarily turned away from the turnstile. “Both were gray, but the second one had a bright red streak along its back and head.”
“Were they looking for the trikes?” I searched for any answer that would explain why they were there, besides hunting for us.
“We have no way of knowing,” Sheela responded in her usual calm voice. “The search for food seems most likely, though. In my experience, predators remain at rest until they are on the hunt.” Though we’d only talked for a handful of minutes, her breathing was back to normal. That was the level of fitness I needed to develop.
Trel clacked her chitinous claws to get our attention.
“See? When there are real emergencies you always return to the cave,” Trel stated matter-of-factly. “Do I need to rehash it all again why we should stay here?”
I was almost never in the mood to tangle with her, and this was no exception. Sheela was nearly hunted down, monsters were roaming the grove, and the bird countdown never stopped ticking.
I was happy no one else rose to meet her challenge, either. That probably pissed her off more than if I’d said something snarky. She sighed heavily when she realized I wasn’t going to reply, and then she strolled back to her nook.
“You know I’m right,” Trel said as a final poke in my eye before sliding her partition closed.
Trel’s rants always had grains of truth to them. We did use the cave as a fallback place of safety, but that’s why we needed the fort as another refuge. Where would we go if the cave was overrun with those orange birds and the predators were waiting out front?
Those raptors had nearly found us, and their presence beside our home changed my whole planning matrix. Making a comfy bed fell completely off the list. Bows and arrows moved right up to the top. As far as weapons go, they were the easiest to envision, though if battling large carnivores was in our future, we’d need to master the ballista, catapult, or something with more of a punch.
The three of us froze again at the sound of another roar. I held my breath for those few seconds, but let it out when it was obvious the dinosaurs were not getting any closer.
“I think they are going back to the lake. That is the direction they were headed when I last saw them,” Sheela added as she looked beyond the turnstile jammed in the door.
Hiding in the cave wasn’t a long-term option because of all the shit which needed to get done outside. But if I took comfort in anything, it was that those giant predators couldn’t hope to sneak up on us. The second the roars were far enough away we had to get back out there, and my heart rate quickened at what I was about to suggest.
“Sheela, let me know when things calm down outside. We both have to go out and get a few things,” I said while standing at the gate with her. Nothing was visible in the grove below us, and the roars were much reduced in volume, but we had to be certain. I shared my thoughts to help calm my nerves.
“I have a job for you,” I said as I pointed to the axe blade. “I want you to find more rocks like this, so we can make more axes. I got five trees down while you were at the stream, but my blade is now very dull. If you have a second one, I bet we can have one wall built by the end of tomorrow. If we have ten of them, we won’t have to worry about sharpening axes during the work day.”
“I can do that,” Sheela said simply.
“Unless you think Trel is hoarding more, you’ll have to search among the rocks outside our cave,” I advised her. To my surprise, Trel didn’t use the opportunity to snipe back at me, which suggested she was still pissed or had no more rocks. Hell, I’d kiss the mean spider-woman if she revealed a stash of axe blades that would eliminate the need to go outside to look for one.
Sheela shook her head no, but also smiled a tiny bit.
“Then I’ll go out with you,” I continued. “The second it’s clear we’ll scrounge around for what we need. You get at least one rock, and I’ll get another axe handle. We can come back in here and make the axe until we are absolutely sure we can return to chopping wood out in the grove.”
We waited for ten minutes as the roars faded into the distance. Sheela’s hearing seemed superior to mine, and she claimed she could still hear them even after I could not. She gave me a nod half a minute later, and I cleared my throat.
“They are far enough away to make a fast sweep outside,” I said as I pointed out the door. “We should hear them coming if they decide to return.”
Galmine helped us push the tree-barrier from the door, and Sheela and I ran down the ramp. She carried her spear, and I carried my axe in my left hand and my own spear in my right.
“I’ll be right over here in these trees,” I called to Sheela as she started searching some of the rock piles near the base of the ramp.
“I will listen for danger,” Sheela replied in her neutral voice. I was scared shitless something was going to swoop in and grab me, but she seemed immune to fear. That was another skill I needed to acquire.
I went right to where I’d already been cutting, and found the proper-sized branch on the same tree where I’d gotten the first axe handle. It only took a few minutes to cut the three-foot length with the new axe, but I didn’t see another that would make for a proper handle.
I jogged right back to where Sheela was still searching for rocks. It didn’t look like she’d found the right stone, yet, so I waited nearby to guard her. I needed to say something to stay occupied.
“I’m so glad you’re okay, Sheela. I don’t know what I’d do--” I said before she interrupted me.
“Thank you, Victor,” she replied. “I was never in real danger.” She picked up a rock that was the shape we needed, but it must have had something wrong with it because she dropped it back to the ground.
“Yeah, well,” I began. “I’ll always worry about you, out there. I worry about all of us, but you do a lot of the dange
rous work. I have to keep giving you the hard jobs, until we have more help.”
“Until we find more abductees on this world?” Sheela answered.
“I was thinking of Trel,” I nudged my head toward the cave. However, Sheela presented a new possibility. My friends from the beach died before we could all escape, but were there others out in the woods waiting to be found? If so, finding help out there might be easier than coaxing Trel into becoming a team player.
“Have you seen others?” I added as an afterthought. I stood with my axe and spear like the castle guard on duty, but I also searched the nearby rocks to see if I could find what we needed and get us out of there.
“No, but they come from fingers of light from the sky. Galmine and Trel both appeared after I saw their beams. I found you because I was heading toward lights I saw in your direction. But they have not reappeared since then.”
I picked up a rock that had the proportions we needed and showed Sheela.
“A little too big Victor, but set it aside,” she advised. “We can use it if we are desperate.”
“You think the lights mean more people are being dropped to the surface?” I asked while chucking the rock just to the side of the path. I then peered out into the grove, worried that I’d taken my eyes off the forest for too many seconds.
“Yes,” Sheela said simply.
“I, uh, don’t remember how I arrived,” I said. “I can’t recall anything of the trip down or any lights.” I tried to help her find the perfect rock, but I was constantly distracted by shrieks and calls that I figured were just birds. We were there for another five minutes before Sheela stepped out from the bushes.
“This is the one.” She held up a rock almost identical to the gray stone Trel had given us. It was wedge-shaped and tapered to one side as if it was intended to be an axe blade. “Would you like me to gather others?”
There were no threats anywhere that I could see, but I wanted to get back to the safety of the cave. Having more rocks would be great but finding them would require additional time outdoors. I anxiously shifted on my feet for a few moments before deciding.
“Yeah, but I don’t like the feel out here. We’ll come outside again when things are back to their normal level of scariness.” I acted like an usher and motioned her up the ramp.
She wasted no time arguing, but she did grab the larger rock that I’d tossed down. I followed her up the ramp and into the cave with only a single look back over my shoulder.
Once we got settled in and working on our projects, my heart rate and imagination came down from the upper atmosphere. We hadn’t encountered any apex predators so far. It was just bad timing the carnivores appeared when Sheela was at the stream getting water.
Minutes later, with the coals burning on my new wooden handle, I let out a long, satisfying sigh. Sheela was already chipping her new axe blade, but she stopped as if knowing I was going to say something. I read her steady golden eyes and knew what a leader would say.
“As long as we don’t hear the big ones again, Sheela and I will return to the grove in the afternoon and cut more wood. The birds are coming, so we can’t stop a project unless the big dinosaurs are right at our door.” I laughed to let them know I wasn’t afraid. I was so thankful we had enough left over fish and water at that moment so we could focus on the big project. “So as soon as we get this extra axe done, we’ll head out.”
Both women smiled to acknowledge my statement and then got back to work. Even though I got up about a hundred times to check the ramp leading up to our cave over the next two hours, I also found the time to burn a hole clear through the handle.
Sheela shaped, sharpened, and polished the stone in the same time I used for the wood burning project. I gave her my contribution and then stood by the turnstile while she hardened the wood, slid in the blade, and tapped it home.
It took about two hours of labor, but the end result was well worth it. We stood next to each other holding our matching axes, and I felt ready to take on the world.
Galmine cooked more bird and a bit of fish as we finished up the second axe. I was happy to have some more calories for the afternoon of cutting ahead of us, but it was another ticking clock in my life. At some point, we needed to put the fort project on hold and restock our food. It would be ten million times easier if Galmine or Trel could go out and take care of that for us, but I could only do the best with the assets I had.
I thought once more about Heracula, Kelg, and the other dead man and how great it would be if they were here. But then I imagined what I’d do if my feline friend wasn’t around and realized it could always be worse.
“This is going to be awesome, Sheela. We’re going to clear this whole forest.” I laughed as we stood together and picked our spears. I was inwardly nervous to go outside and leave the safety of the ramp, but I was happy she and I were going to be working right next to each other.
“I am ready,” she said as if I was about to open the door to battle.
We pushed out the turnstile and once again emerged from our safe little cave. The heat hit me like I’d walked into a sauna and I thought back to the humidity of the morning from the overnight rain. I had more sweating to do, but that hardly bothered me because I didn’t hear those carnivorous dinosaurs.
“Anything out there?” I said to Sheela knowing she was listening for predators.
“No. We are safe, for now,” she counselled.
I almost joked that there were a million other threats on a planet loaded with prehistoric monsters, but stopped myself because that wouldn’t be helpful. Instead, I took the first steps down the ramp.
We walked warily to the clump of trees I’d cut, which gave Sheela a chance to see how much progress I’d made.
“You cut all these down?” Sheela asked. “This is going to go much faster with two axes.”
“Let’s drag these over to the construction site so we can use them to create an outline of the fort,” I suggested while I pointed to where we already stashed that first tree. Before we cut a bunch more trees, I wanted to see how things were going to lay out. It was how my mind operated when in empire-building mode.
Over the next hour, we dragged each of the downed trees to the job site. We stuffed our spears into the branches as we moved them, but this time we also hooked our axes on the same trees as extra insurance. Gradually our heightened vigilance fell back to normal alertness so we could focus on our jobs.
It took time to cut off the branches and tops of each twenty-footer to make the poles somewhat long and straight. We dumped the odd-shaped extra wood in a pile on the back side of the giant sequoia. If we left it there long enough, it would dry out and be useful for firewood.
I used a stick to hack down ferns and other plants next to the trunk of our home redwood. I chose an area just to the left of the tree, as seen from the cave, so that the two sites were about forty yards from each other and in direct line of sight. When I was done getting it ready, we had the perfect flat space to build.
“Our best bet is to have three walls of logs,” I said while surveying the tree trunks lying next to our chosen redwood. “I think we talked about using the giant trunk as a corner, but look how big it is. We can use it as the whole wall.”
We re-arranged three logs into the shape I needed. When we were done, we had created a twenty by twenty enclosure with three logs joined by the fourth wall of the tree itself. We’d have to work out a door, but it became apparent how we would build our new camp.
“We’ll be able to lean logs right up against the tree to make our living space,” I said as if I managed a construction site. “We’ll be shielded completely from wind and rain coming from that side.” I pointed to the right of the tree.
“It is a very good design, Victor,” Sheela replied.
I would have felt better if I could get Trel out to look it over before we started. She was the real architect, and her approval could potentially save a lot of wasted effort, but without her, we had to do the best we
could.
I moved the logs on the ground a few more times to account for how we would join the corners. We were going to try to link them like a log cabin, but it was hard to plan that out without a sketch pad or even some dust to draw crude lines. We talked about making the square into a hexagon so the walls would be shorter and easier to cut but neither of us could say for sure which was more efficient.
“My people always build rectangles,” Sheela said after we’d moved one of the logs for the fifth time. “It seems the easiest shape for our limited cutting options.”
That’s what it all came down to. There were probably smarter ways of doing it, but there were plenty of trees of the correct height for making twenty-foot logs. If we made the walls shorter, we’d waste more of the trees and would have to cut down even greater numbers of them. We’d struck the perfect balance.
“That works for me,” I said. “A rectangle it is.” I was happy to have the plan written in stone, and we moved the example walls one last time so that we had our final square.
“Come and get some water,” Galmine cheerfully chirped from midway down the ramp.
I glanced quickly at my silver-haired friend and then turned to check the grove to ensure nothing was going to come out and grab her. When I saw it was still safe, I pulled off my hat to air my head.
The blazing sun beat down on my exposed head, and I swallowed once in response to seeing the small water pot she held in her hands.
“I admit she has come at just the right time,” Sheela said. She wasn’t dripping sweat as much as me, but that wasn’t saying much. Yesterday I’d ripped off my long-sleeved shirt to keep cool but there was no beating the saturating humidity.
“I didn’t think you ever complained,” I said with a smile.
“It is not a complaint. It is a statement of fact,” Sheela said while trying to stay serious.
I patted my hat onto my head before we grabbed spears and axes and walked toward Galmine. I watched all around for animals but couldn’t help noticing Sheela was hiding a prim smile.
