“Nocturnal feeders?”
“Bleeders! Sucked the blood and then chewed the flesh . . . like what's been feeding on Mabel . . . No, it couldn't be Galormis. Teeth are too big.”
“Why on earth call it Mabel?”
“Knew someone like her once, a walking appetite, hating the world around her, suspicious and constantly confused. Not much intelligence.”
“What would you name the avian?”
“I don't know,” she said after regarding the furry face. “It isn't easy until you've actually met the creature. But this species has intelligence and personality. I want to see more of them!”
“Thought you would. Although we couldn't tag them. They moved too fast. Kept up with the sled at cruising speed.”
“Very good.” A yawn caught her unawares. “All this fresh air, chasing wounded animals to doctor them what don't wish to be helped.” She stroked his cheek and gave him a regretful smile of apology. “I'm going to bed. And you ought to, too, co-leader. Sleep on our puzzles. Maybe sleep'll solve 'em.”
Kai could have wished it had, but he woke the next morning feeling refreshed and the teams, when assembled, were in such good spirits that his rose, too.
“I've discussed secondary camps with Varian. Until she has catalogued the habits of the predators, she can't guarantee our safety,” said Kai, “but she's going to set and search areas into which we can move, if we adhere to the safeguards she devises. Okay? Sorry, but you'll understand better if you've seen the marks on the herbivore's flank.” He noticed by the grim expressions that everyone had looked at the creature.
“Boss, what about the gaps in the old cores, here, here and here?” asked Triv, pointing out the areas south-west and due south.
“Faults,” said Gaber, slipping a scale transparency over the seismic map. “I read a massive overthrust here. Good area to search now but any seismimic would have been crushed. Or subsided too far below the surface to transmit.”
“Triv, you and Margit explore that overthrust today. Aulia and Dimenon, your sector is here,” and he gave them the coordinates in the south-west, and to Berru and Portegin, explaining that he and Bakkun would try to explore the Rift Valley since there were old cores leading up to it. He stressed that they maintain safety procedures, tag or telltale animals when possible, and note and report any scavengers circling over what could be injured livestock specimens for Varian.
As Kai and Bakkun lifted in their sled, Kai saw Varian on her way down to the corral. He saw the herbivore, Mabel, busily eating her way through what trees remained in the enclosure.
Bakkun, who preferred to pilot, brought the sled on its south-east heading.
“Why didn't our Theks know this planet'd been cored?” the heavy-worlder asked.
“I haven't asked our Theks if they know. But Ireta was not marked as surveyed.”
“Theks have their reasons.”
“Such as?”
“I do not presume to guess,” replied Bakkun, “but they always have good reasons.”
Kai liked Bakkun as a team mate: he was inexhaustible, coolheaded like all his race, thorough and dependable. But he had no imagination, no flexibility and once convinced of anything, refused to change his opinion in the face of the most telling facts. Theks were, to him as to many of the short-spanned species, infallible and godlike. Kai did not wish, however, to enter into any argument with Bakkun, particularly on such a heresy as Thek fallibility proven in the existence of seismic cores on this planet.
Fortunately the telltale bleeped. Bakkun automatically corrected course and Kai watched the remote-distance screen attentively. This time it was more herbivores, running away from the sled's whine, through the thick rain forest, occasionally careering off trees so hard the top branches shuddered wildly.
“Come round again, Bakkun,” Kai asked and flipped up the tape switch, hanging in against his seat strap as Bakkun acted promptly to his order. He swore under his breath because none of the creatures crossed any of the clearings, almost as if they expected an aerial attack and were crowding under whatever cover they could find.
“Never mind, Bakkun. Continue on course. I thought I saw another flank-damaged beast.”
“We see them daily, Kai.”
“Why didn't you mention it in your reports?”
“Didn't know it was important, Kai. Too much else to mention bearing on our job . . .”
“This is a joint effort . . .”
“Agreed, but I must know how to contribute. I didn't know the mere ecological balances were essential knowledge, too.”
“My omission. But you would do well to report any unusual occurrence.”
“It is my impression, Kai, that there is nothing usual about Ireta. I have been a geologist for many standard years now and I have never encountered a planet constantly in a Mesozoic age and unlikely to evolve beyond that stage.” Bakkun gave Kai a sideways glance, sly and mysterious. “Who would expect to find old cores registering on such a planet?”
“Expect the unexpected! That's the unofficial motto of our profession, isn't it?”
The sun, having briefly appeared in the early morning to oversee the beginnings of day, now retired behind clouds. A local ground fog made flying momentarily difficult so conversation was discontinued. Kai busied himself with the seismic overlay, checking the old cores which faintly glowed on the
screen in response to his signal.
The cores advanced beyond the line of flight, right down into the rift valley, subsiding with the floor which composed the wide plateau. They were entering the valley now and Bakkun needed all his attention on his flying as the thermals caught the light sled and bounced it around. Once past the line of ancient volcanoes, their plugged peaks gaunt fingers to the now lowering rainclouds, their slopes supporting marginal vegetation, Bakkun guided the sled towards the central rift valley. The face of the fault block exposed the various strata of the uplift that had formed the valley. As the little sled zipped past, saucily irreverent of the frozen geohistory, Kai was filled with a mixture of awe and amusement: awe of the great forces still working which had formed the rift and might very well reform it times imaginable in the existence of this planet; and amusement that Man dared to pinpoint one tiny moment of those inexorable courses and attempt to put his mark upon it.
“Scavengers, Kai,” said Bakkun, breaking in on his thoughts. Bakkun gestured slightly starboard by the bow. Kai sighted the display on the scope.
“It's the golden fliers, not scavengers.”
“There is a difference?”
“Indeed there is, but what are they doing a couple of hundred kilometres from the nearest large water?”
“Are they dangerous?” asked Bakkun, with a show of interest.
“I don't think so. They are intelligent, showed curiosity in us yesterday, but what are they doing so far inland?”
“We shall soon know. We're closing fast.”
Kai slanted the scope to take in the groups on the ground. The fliers were now alerted to the presence of an unfamiliar aerial object and all the heads were turned upward. Kai saw threads of coarse grass hanging from several beaks. And, sure enough, as the sled circled, their elongated heads curiously followed its course. Some of the smaller fliers pecked again at the grass.
“Why would they have to come so far? For a grass?”
“I am not xeno-biologically trained,” said Bakkun in his stolid fashion. Then his voice took on a note of such unusual urgency that Kai swung round, scope and all and instinctively recoiled against the seatback. “Look?”
“What the . . .”
The rift valley narrowed slightly where a horst protruded and, from the narrow defile, emerged one of the largest creatures that Kai had ever seen, its stalky, awkward gait frightening in its inexorable progress. Sharpening the scope for the increased distance, Kai watched as the colossus strutted on its huge hindlegs into the peaceful valley.