Deathbeast
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Occasionally the wind would blow toward the hunters, bringing them the pungent odor of all the blood and death. It was not totally unpleasant to Ethab, but it was strong—it made him think of stockyards, acres of meat stretching out toward the horizon, raw flesh waiting to be slaughtered, skinned, eviscerated, and hung to age.
The others, Nusa, Megan, Loevil, and Tril were sitting slightly farther back, out of range of the worst of the wind and smell. There was a clustered outcrop of rocks that
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provided not only shelter, but even a few comfortable places to sit. They munched quietly on their own ration bars, sullen and separate, each involved in his or her own meal—somewhat angry and casting wary glances at each other; not like humans, but like apes, Australopithecus, each protecting his own catch from the hungers of the others. Dusk slanted sideways across their rocky shelter, reflecting off their eyes in golden points. Loevil noticed the odd effect of the light and stopped eating abruptly. It was as if something about the prehistoric world was turning them into primitives—as if the planet wasn’t ready yet for intelligence, and if they were to be allowed to fit into its scheme of things they would have to stop being human and return to an earlier stage of their evolution; they would have to be animals, suspicious, wary, self- involved, and existing only for the moment, with neither memory of the past nor conception of the future.
Loevil’s gaze slid slowly around the camp, taking it all in. Megan was hunched introspectively into herself. Nusa was munching distractedly on a chewy bar of. rubbery something—not because she was hungry, but because it was something to do. Even Tril was feeding herself now; there was a crumble of mealy fragments on a wrapper in her lap and she was putting the tiny pieces into her mouth in slow, mechanical movements. Separated, at a distance, but on a high-up rock where they could see both the carrion and the camp, were Kalen and Ethab. Their backs were to each other and their attitudes were watchful—but equally sullen. As if they had a job to do and were bound to do it, but if they didn’t have to talk to each other while they did it, they wouldn’t. Loevil’s eyes narrowed as he studied them—what was it that they reminded him of?
Then Ethab scratched himself in a self-satisfied manner, and Loevil knew.
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There was a piece of film; an anthropologist had brought it back from ... two million years B.c. He called it The Dawn of Man. The terrible lizards had been ten million years dead by then and the mammals had quickly moved into prominence, taking over the dinosaurs’ ecological niches. The film had shown a group—a tribe?—of apelike men, or manlike apes (it was all in the eyes of the beholder) as they went about their day-to-day activities, A monitoring module had been dropped into their grazing area for three days. The first part of the film showed them discovering the module, startled, reacting to it, screeching at it, challenging it, then darting in and sniffing at it, approaching it curiously, sniffing again, touching it, and even tasting it. The whole tribe had gathered about the module, almost worshipfully; then, as they discovered that the module was—to them, anyway—inert, they left it alone. As the day wore on, they returned to their normal life patterns, scrounging for grubs and insects, nuts and berries, foraging for the odd root or bit of carrion, or arguing with another nearby tribe over the water hole. The module had recorded it all.
There was one shot though, near dusk, when the largest male of the tribe had taken a position on the highest rock overlooking their nesting ground. He had looked at the moon, the sky, and the land all around. He had scratched himself in a self-satisfied manner, the lord of his domain, as he sat back to enjoy his reign, the master of all he surveyed.
That’s what Ethab’s action had reminded Loevil of.
Here was the tribe, the females, the children, the smaller and weaker males—Loevil disliked that thought— finished with their foraging for the day, settling in for the night, and the two strongest and most aggressive males taking up their positions of rightful dominance, enjoying
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their reign, the masters, scratching themselves and belching in comfortable contentment.
We haven’t changed much, have we? Loevil thought. The pattern was the same for Australopithecus and Homo sapiens. Perhaps the only difference was that Homo sapiens indulged himself in the vanity of thinking he was superior.
Loevil thought about that.
If that was the case, then Homo sapiens was really the one worse off.
Not Homo sapiens, the “thinking man”—merely Simius superbus, the “proud ape.” Ape with hubris. Portrait of an ecological accident looking for a place to happen. Ape without humility. Ape without the perspective that the universe could still destroy him casually, without even noticing. Ape without awareness that he is part of a larger system, thinking that he is independent of it—and thereby daring it to do its worst.
And it will, thought Loevil. It will.
The truly intelligent ape, Loevil decided, was the one who analyzed the situation completely, planned for the worst, hoped for the best, and was prepared for every eventuality. The ape rah scenarios in his head of what might happen, evaluating each to determine which resolution of each possibility would provide the most efficient and beneficial solution for himself—and for the others around him; stability can’t exist where there is inequity. Hmm. ... Scenarios were merely models of situations, they could only be manipulated where there was conception of the future as well as knowledge of the past; a model can’t be worked unless one has experience with the situation it’s a model of. The whole is called time-binding ability, and Loevil sat and thought and de->- cided that a person’s time-binding ability was an effective measure of his or her degree of humanness.
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Or was it?
K time-binding was the difference between man and ape, Loevil knew a few people who were still functioning on the primate level; he couldn’t help but think of them as chimpanzees. He was a snob that way, he admitted it, was even a little proud of it. “Can you take them to the museum and talk art to them?” was his measure of a person’s worth. What were their perspectives?
That was the problem with gauging Ethab—he acted like an ape, but he had the ability to be a man. Loevil couldn’t understand why he preferred to be an ape.
Ethab’s ability to plan, to look ahead and deal with the consequences, was as good as anyone’s—but the directions into which he turned his ability were less than exalted. It was as if he were using his time-binding ability to be only a super-ape, and had no care at all to be human. Perhaps it wasn’t time-binding alone that was the measure of a man, Loevil pondered. Maybe a larger perspective was needed too. Or maybe compassion.
But that still didn’t answer the question about Ethab— why did he prefer to be a super-ape when he could just as easily be a competent man?
Or maybe it wasn’t just as easy....
Maybe, just maybe, being a better ape than all the others is somehow better than merely being just one more competent human being. Maybe it’s better to be a leader of a lesser pack than a member of a smarter one.
—but Loevil couldn’t see how. It wasn’t something he desired, and it wasn’t a situation he could feel comfortable with. He shrugged the puzzle into the same dusty unused comer of his mind that he reserved for questions like, “Why is a raven like a writing desk?” and “Where does your lap go when you stand up?” He didn’t know if there was an answer, and he wasn’t sure if it was worth the trouble to find out.
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He toot another bite of his ration bar—he hadn’t even noticed he was eating it; it had a taste somewhere between sawdust-chicken and baked hockey puck—and tossed part of the wrapper behind him; it fell into a crevice between two rocks, startling a tiny land shrew; a pseudo-mammaloid, rodent-like thing with eyes like little saucers. It bared its teeth at the wrapper, then approached curiousl
y, sniffing and wriggling its nose. It had tiny pink paws, silver-brown fur striped like a chipmunk, and a short fluff of a tail.
Another part of the wrapper came fluttering down on it—and the creature jumped, whirling to hiss and snap at it. He raised himself up on his tiny hind legs and challenged the offending foil. “Peep!”
Loevil heard the sound and glanced into the crevice behind him—the little creature was darting and biting at the latest piece of wrapper. It stopped when it discovered its attacker was not fighting back. It stopped and sniffed at it.
Loevil broke off a piece of his ration bar and dropped it into the crevice—almost hitting the mouselike thing. It yiped in startlement, as if the foil ration wrapper had bit him, and skittered off in panic, disappearing into a hole beneath the rocks.
Watching, Loevil was amused. The little animal had learned its lessons at least. Everything is potentially dangerous—especially a free meal: Trust no one. At least, not in this world.
And maybe not in the next one either.
Loevil shook his head and turned back to tlje larger view. The little creatures in this world didn’t have much fight; it was the big ones you had to watch out for. He turned back around—
Ethab was giving instructions to Nusa, Kalen, and Megan. Loevil slid off his rock to join them.
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“—two people on watch at all times. One of them up there on the forward rock to watch the bait, the other down in that gully to watch the approach from that side so we’re not caught by surprise again. It’s a pretty wide gully, but there’s plenty of cover. Kalen, you go first on the rock—take Loevil’s scanner.” He pulled it off Loevil’s shoulder without even a glance. “Nusa, you take first watch in the gully. We’ll work in two-hour shifts and everybody will work both positions before the night is over.” He glanced around. Megan looked up from what she was doing and nodded in agreement; she was just bedding Tril down for the night. Tril’s expression was still vacant, child-like and innocent. Ethab turned back. “The rest of us will try and get some sleep.” He stepped past Loevil to where Kalen had spread the rifles across the ground and the two of them resumed checking the weapons’ fuel cells.
At midnight, Ethab was still waiting for the deathbeast. Kalen had watched for two hours, then Loevil, and nothing had happened. Now, five and a half hours after they had begun their long watch, Megan was on the point and Ethab was taking a turn in the gully—perhaps the beast would come up this way . . . but as yet only the wind whispered through this pass.
The night brooded like an empty black shroud; the air was cold and the stars were a haze of infinity and brilliance. The steady chirrup-chirrup-buzz of nocturnal insects gave the darkness a background of soft droning, like a ringing in the ears just below the threshold of annoyance. The wind was a cold touch, an icy feather brushing at the back of the neck—it pulled at sleeves and collars, just enough to keep reminding of its presence.
Megan waited on the rocky point overlooking the bait. Through her goggles, the meadow was a scarlet charnel
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house. Half-eaten carcasses, ripped and tom-open bodies lay everywhere; most of them were scored and burned, some were still identifiable. A few parasites still worked, scavengers the size of rats, but nothing larger—mostly the meadow was still and silent. Waiting. Only the stench of blood and meat remained. The wind brought it to her like a sour gift. She checked her scanner routinely, then, frowning, touched the button of her communicator. “Ethab?”
His voice came crackling back. “Talk to me.”
“Funny readings,” she said.
“Beeping?”
“No—just a flicker on the edges of the field.”
“Proximity?” he asked.
“No localization. Too much interference.”
“Lights?”
“I’m still green.” She switched to a different scanning spectrum, then back again. “Both ranges. But with this interference, my best is down to only a few hundred meters—and that’s line-of-sight at best.” She touched the controls again, switching back and forth. “Something is moving around out there, but I can’t tell you where or what. I’m only getting field wobblies, no parameters.” She stopped and waited for his reply.
Ethab was silent a moment, thinking. His hand slid inside his shirt and touched his implants meditatively.
Back at camp, Loevil, Kalen, and Nusa were sitting up, awake and only idly listening to the conversation crackling on the open channel. Their eyes gleamed whitely in the pale moonlight as they looked at each other’s faces.
“Ethab?” Megan asked. Her voice came filtering through the tiny speaker.
“All right,” he answered finally. “I’m coming up. Kalen?” he called.
“Check?”
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“Cover my position, I’m going forward.”
“Check,” And Kalen was up and moving through the darkness. Nusa and Loevil looked at each other. Nusa was wrapped in a foil blanket; Loevil was huddled inside his jacket, his scanner on his lap. He realized he was shivering even though he wasn’t cold. What was happening out there?
Ethab moved softly through the grass and up to Megan’s vantage on the rocky point. He climbed up slowly—and was oddly pleased that she met him with a wary rifle. Good, that meant she was being cautious.
“Still nothing,” she said, swinging her rifle back around to cover the bait again.
Ethab moved up beside her, pulling the scanner to him. He held it steady in his left hand and slowly turned with it, first to the right, then to the left, then back to the center again. He watched its screen carefully. “What does his mean?” he asked.
Megan looked. “Urn, that’s a—” She touched her communicator. “Loevil, are you showing anything?”
Loevil checked his scanner again before replying, “Only interference.”
“Kalen?” Megan asked, “Is there anything near you?” “Uh—there is now—” Kalen’s voice was rushed. Something large and dark was just passing by his hiding place in the gully; he was pulling his head down as he spoke. After a bit, he raised it again and looked, his goggles now in place. “The bait is working all right—” Then, “—but it’s not the beast yet. It’s another carnivore. I can’t identify it. Except for the beast, it’s the biggest we’ve seen yet.” He paused. “I make it out to be some kind of allosaur—I think. I can’t tell.”
“Never mind,” said Ethab, pulling his own goggles into place. “We can see it now.”
The meadow was a scarlet glare, outlined in gold and
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purple, almost-black; the allosaur was moving like a nightmare-shadow directly toward the bait.
Next to Ethab, Megan was adjusting the focus on her goggles. “It’s a small one,” she said. “Probably less than three years old—I’ll bet it masses only a little more than three tons.” To her communicator, she said, “You can relax, kids; it’s only a party crasher.” As she snapped the safety off and armed her rifle, she added, “Some dinosaurs never know when they’re not wanted.”
Ethab glanced at her. “You’ve been hanging around Loevil too long. You’re beginning to sound like him.” Megan half-shrugged. “Well, why not? We sleep together.”
Ethab looked at her sharply—
He shook his head, almost imperceptibly.
Megan?!! And Loevil?!! He couldn’t conceive of it. Try as he might, the mental image wouldn’t ceme. No, she must have been joking—
But she hadn’t sounded like she was—
He couldn’t tell what her expression was through the goggles—she was just an orange blur with purple auras coming off of it. Her eyes were shielded by her own filters.
But Loevil—?? She might as well sleep with another woman! (Maybe that was it, an inner demon suggested. Maybe that’s why she preferred Loevil to himself, a reed man. He smiled. Yes, that would explain a lot....)
Huddled in her blanket, Nusa grumbled at Loevil, “And what happens when the big one does show up? Do we get stuck here on the sidelines?”
Loevil grinned at her, his teeth flashing white in the darkness. “Tbat’d be okay with me.” He added, “I never
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thought that killing a dinosaur was all that much of a challenge anyway. Now, painting slogans on their sides—that would be a challenge.”
She blinked at him. “I beg your pardon?”
“Well, you know, something like: ‘Hold this dinosaur up to the light for a secret message.’ Can you imagine the look on Ethab’s face when he sees that? I mean, anyone can kill a dinosaur...” He stopped and glanced over at her, to gauge her reactions.
In spite of herself, the comers of her mouth twitched into the hint of a smile. The image was funny—not the dinosaur so much as Ethab’s confusion....
“Or how about this?—” Loevil continued expansively. “ ‘Continued on next dinosaur.’ ”
“Mm, no—I like the first one better. It’s more outrageous.”
“Good, then it’s settled. You hold the dinosaur, and I’ll paint him. Okay?”
“How come you always get the easy jobs?”
“Okay, I’ll hold it, you paint.”
“Let’s paint a small one and wait till it grows up—It’ll be easier.”
“We won’t be here then. Besides, the point of the whole thing is the challenge—something that’ll boggle Ethab’s mind—”
She considered it for a heartbeat. “That shouldn’t be too hard.” She allowed herself the pleasure of the moment’s brief hostility—she knew it wouldn’t last. She knew that when Ethab returned, she would see him differently again—but she didn’t like to think of that. It made her lose some of her self-respect. Not the thought of being Ethab’s woman, but what she would do to earn that role....