Tsopi approached the deadfall, dinosaur in galloping pursuit. The trap was a huge pit, ten feet deep and forty in diameter, covered by a network of crisscrossing vine stems. It was not concealed; dinosaurs’ eyes were not so sharp, and their brains not so good as to decipher its menace before putting a foot in it. Natural hazards were one thing; natural selection had bred care. But artificial hazards were only a century old, and the dinosaurs had not had time to learn yet. All that had been necessary was to build it several weeks before the hunt, to give the man-smell time to wear thin. Old Snort would crash through the vine segments and fall in—and though his shoulder was two feet taller than the drop, his mass and musculature were such that he would not be able to climb out. Forward propulsion was not the same as upward movement, as the Polarian’s problem with climbing showed.
Suddenly Tsopi veered away from the deadfall—followed of course by Old Snort. Both skirted the edge, and the dinosaur did not fall in.
“The alien fool!” the man next to Flint exclaimed. “Why didn’t he go over it, the way we planned?”
Why not, indeed? Had the Polarian deliberately sabotaged the hunt?
Now they were looping back—toward the men. Tsopi accelerated right at Flint. If old Snort continued on his course—well, they could scatter, but one or two more men would be trampled.
“Plint!” Tsopi cried, her tentacle touching the ground. “I cannot cross the trap at speed!”
Then Flint realized his mistake. A man would have bounded from one vine to the other automatically, safely, but the Polarian could not jump. Not that way. The crisscrossing vines were an impassable menace.
“Move toward it—then dodge aside!” Flint cried. “Old Snort can’t turn as fast as you can.”
“Right!” The Polarian looped about again, and such was the concentration of the dinosaur that he charged right by Flint without seeing him. One-track body, one-track mind.
But Old Snort was slowing; he could not maintain charge speed for long. That would complicate the trap; he might lose interest in the uncatchable alien and turn to the slower men. “Let him follow close!” Flint called. And wondered how it was that the earless Polarian could hear him.
Tsopi eased off, letting the dinosaur catch up. They headed back toward the deadfall, the small form almost merging with the large one.
“Now she’s playing it too close!” Flint muttered nervously, seeing Old Snort’s horn almost snag the alien. Tsopi dodged aside, right at the brink of the deadfall. Old Snort tried to twist, and he was now going slowly enough so that his body did lurch over. But his front feet were on the vines, and under his weight they snapped like twigs and let him down. He plowed horns-first into the pit.
Vine logs flew up in a momentary splay. A foot-thick piece came down on Tsopi, knocking her into the pit.
“Oh, no!” Flint cried. Suddenly the peace of Spheres was imperiled. He sprinted toward the deadfall.
“Stay clear!” someone called. “There’s no getting out of that hole!”
But Flint ran to the edge. The dinosaur seemed stunned; he was on his knees and not moving. The Polarian was wobbling crazily, but she was alive.
Old Snort shuddered. His head turned, and he struggled to rise from his knees. As he had half-slid over the edge, the dirt had been scraped into a pile at the bottom. That, and the cushioning effect of the vines, had spared the dinosaur from immediate harm. Still, a drop of ten feet was a considerable jolt for fifteen tons, and in other circumstances could have been fatal.
Now the Polarian was in trouble. She could not climb out, even where the edge was broken down, and her gyrations were attracting the notice of the dinosaur. The massive head swung about, the three horns orienting. Half stunned and stupid the monster might be, but in the confines of the pit he would soon smash Tsopi flat.
Flint slid down the broken wall, landing solidly but safely at the bottom. He drew his handax from its harness and rapped Old Snort’s longest nose horn smartly. It clanged like a dry hollow vine. “Hi-ya, stupid!” he yelled.
The dinosaur lunged to his feet, snorting. He had been well named; the blast was deafening. But his little eye was fixed on Tsopi; he had not yet realized that there were now two creatures in the pit with him. The beast bucked his horns forward.
“Permit me!” Flint screamed over the ringing in his ears from the snort. He threw his arms about Tsopi’s torso and heaved the alien into the air. The torso squeezed together like a bag of water. The horns rammed into the wall of the pit, immediately below the Polarian’s hanging wheel.
Old Snort wrenched his head up. Dirt and sand sprayed, and another section of wall collapsed. Flint leaped aside, carrying the alien. The surface of Tsopi’s torso was oddly slick, though dry, as though it had been polished. The large wheel spun slowly.
Flint brushed by the flaring shield of bone that guarded Old Snort’s neck; it was taller than he was, and monstrous muscles were attached to it.
The dinosaur whipped his shield about, trying to smash the two tiny figures. This was one maneuver he was good at! Flint put out one foot. The edge of the shield caught. As it swung through, Flint walked right up over the saddle-shape.
Old Snort bucked his head up and back, and the two were thrown off. They skidded down the corrugated back. They were now above the level of the ground—but there was no way to step across to it.
Flint half-slid, half-stepped on down to the ground beside the dinosaur’s tail. He set Tsopi down. “I think we’re in trouble, friend,” he remarked. “Sorry if I squeezed you too tight”
“I am better now,” the Polarian said. “I shall return the favor.” And she scooted forward.
Old Snort was just turning, unable to maneuver freely because his flanks kept banging into the walls of the pit. They were in danger of being crushed between the hulking body and the hard sand of the wall. Flint made a mental note: if he got out of this, and if he ever had charge of a pit-construction crew, he would dig several man-sized holes in the base. Probably no man would ever again be caught in such a place with a live dinosaur, but…
Tsopi shot past the broad shield and around the blunt beak, making a keening noise. Even to Flint, that sound had an annoying quality. No doubt that was the intent.
The three horns snapped about, going after Tsopi with amazing accuracy. The Polarian squished aside and the horns missed—barely—and plowed into the wall again. More dirt tumbled down. Old Snort wrenched the horns up—apparently this was an automatic goring reflex, an excellent maneuver against a twenty-foot-tall carnosaur—and ripped out a larger section. What had taken the tribe weeks to excavate, this dinosaur was taking only moments to demolish.
But even as that awful armored nose cleared, Tsopi was wheeling back over the loose dirt, leaving cross-hatched treadmarks in the soft surface, taunting the dinosaur with that keening sound. For an instant the tentacle even touched one of the great horns, and the keening became momentarily louder as the hollow horn amplified it. It was like spitting in the face of the monster!
Suddenly Flint realized what the alien was doing. She was making the dinosaur dig their way out of the hole. Every pass meant another gap in the wall, another mound of dirt in the bottom. Already there was a yard of it piled, and a six-foot section of wall had been demolished. Of course Flint himself could have made it out, if Old Snort gave him time. He could jump and catch the edge of the pit and lift himself out, if the turf didn’t crumble. But he couldn’t carry the Polarian out and the alien was too heavy to throw that far up.