“It’s a buckeye all right—and something sure is chasing him,” said Toothpick.
The naked prey passed them about a half-mile away and turned toward the canal. When he reached it he ran smoothly along the bank, apparently in no hurry. Then the hunter came—new suit of green-and-brown camouflage, helmet, and bow. He was fat and puffed strenuously. Suddenly he stopped, took a deep breath, paused a few seconds, and ran on smoothly.
“Speed,” said Moon. “That buckeye is in for a good workout.”
Moon dropped back into the ditch, explaining. “That hunter will be awake and tracking for three or four days—on Speed. His body will be virtually torn to pieces by the exertion, but the drugs will mask it. That buckeye looks young—may not have been educated by one of the wise old stags—may not be able to shake off the hunter’s detector. If so, he’ll be in real trouble in a couple of days—especially if he gets arrow-shot. I’d like to— Say! There’s a coweye back here.”
Toothpick interjected, “It is okay. She’s in the follicular phase.”
Moses partially untangled himself from her arms and legs. “I know—” he said sheepishly.
Her dialect was fuzzy, but her motivations were easy to understand. She had an ovum waiting in a tense follicle and had selected young Moses to fertilize it. Her estrogen-flushed body responded to the presence of Moses—a sexually mature male. Homologous erectile tissue in her nasal septum swelled. She sneezed, and swelling backed up into her orbits giving her eyes a heavy-lidded, sleepy appearance. Capillary beds became engorged producing a maculopapular rash over her trunk. She kept one hand on Moses’ thigh and her lips on his shoulder while Moon and Toothpick tried to assess the situation.
Moses was a little apprehensive too. One copulation apparently had done little to satisfy her. She wasn’t after orgasmic release—she wanted to be fertilized. And Moses wasn’t going anywhere until the golden corpus luteum freed him.
He studied her—physically. The hand on his thigh was strong. She was perhaps a fraction of an inch taller than he—but it was difficult to judge with her pillowy head of hair. Her lower belly was marked by the striae of at least one previous pregnancy. Above those little scars was a rope belt and her nasty-looking wooden knife. And above that were a pair of breasts—flushed and mottled. Her bone and muscle alone intimidated him—for he was fresh from the hive. His own body just did not have the calcium or collagen to stand up against her if her wrath became aroused.
His apprehension melted when she led them to her nest—a foxhole in the bank of the canal. It was lined with leaves and contained a sleeping, two-year-old female child. She offered them shellfish meat. Blinking and smiling, she dove into the canal for more. Old grumpy Moon smiled and played with the little kid when she awoke. The mother called Moses into the water and they gathered more food for the evening meal.
With due consideration for his refractory interval, she nuzzled him repeatedly in the water—finally copulating again in the reedy waters on the opposite side of the canal.
That night, as the lunar crescent reflected in the canal, Toothpick, Moon and Dan stretched out to sleep at a respectable distance from her nest. Privacy—a luxury as rare as love, since both disappear when crowding destroys the meaning of sexual signals.
Moses curled up with her in the nest. She spent the night alternating between napping and pleasuring him.
At dawn Moses was euphoric. Moon found him diving for their breakfast. The pile of shellfish was growing to banquet size.
“You’d better leave a seed zone,” said Moon jokingly.
Obviously Moses had been sexually imprinted on the young coweye. It would be painful when the luteal phase came and drove them apart. Recent evolutionary adjustment had favored the females who mated briefly and traveled alone. Family groups attracted hunters. After fertilization the presence of a male would be a useless hazard.
“I’ll be staying,” Moses explained to Toothpick and Moon.
She busied herself serving the men and feeding her child.
“I know,” said Moon simply. “We’ll move on. Remember to stay below the profile of the bank. You don’t want to attract hunters here with a two-year-old. See that ridge, about ten miles away. Toothpick tells me there is a lot of safe cover just on the other side. We’ll probably rest up there for a couple of weeks. If you change your mind—we’ll be there.”
“I’m staying.”
Moses put an arm around the little coweye and hugged her briefly.
Ten days later he caught up with Moon and Dan in rough country. Dan wagged his tail three times.
“She changed,” Moses said, perplexed.
Moon nodded. No comment was necessary. He had explained the hormone cycle before.
“She was so in love. So tender. So soft—her mouth, her fingers—so soft.”
Moses recalled Simple Willie’s mumbles about the most beautiful thing in the world. It must have been like this for him too—love.
“But it wasn’t love,” complained Moses. “Just hormones.”
“Don’t say—just hormones, boy. That was the best kind of love—old, basic emotion. She wanted to have your kid with every molecule in her body. That’s how it is. You can’t sit down and reason out that kind of love.”
“But why couldn’t she let me stay with her? I could help feed her and the kids—protect them—help with the childbirth—”
Old Moon shrugged.
“Maybe you could have—one day. But not now. The Big ES has no room for family units. Living alone is an adaptation against hunters—necessary for survival. Try to forget her—for now.”
Fat Walter sat in Garage alone—his folds of belly and flank adipose tissue draped over a stool. Bird Dog IV was coming in. He observed the approach on the screen… worrying about the light, easy way the old craft maneuvered—almost effortlessly—as if it were carrying a very small load. When it set down he walked over through the dust and opened the chlorophyll-stained hatch. Dag was alone—thinner and wide-eyed. His helmet was missing, and the skin of his face was red and blistered. He struggled out of the seat and stumbled stiff-legged to the back of the cabin. Picking up a cubed trophy, he smiled weakly.
“Got one! An old toothless female. I was on the trail of a nice young buck. Got one arrow into him, but he kept going… followed him for almost two days. Then she started stalking me. Dangerous too—had this mean-looking wooden knife. Here, you can add it to your teaching files. By the time I stopped her I couldn’t pick up the young buck’s trail again.” He reached back into the cab. “She was wearing these beads. Odd, but I thought I saw a similar string on the kid too—same tribe or clan, I guess. Got some good optic records for you, too.”
Dag Foringer gathered his gear and started to leave.
“Took off your helmet?” said Walter.
Dag gingerly touched his blisters—nodding meekly.
“Better have the white team look at it before you go.”
Walter watched him leave. There had been no mention of the rest of the hunters who had gone out with him. The inside of the cab gave no clue—the usual rubbish and offal littered the corners.
Walter patted the old machine.
“Any idea where the other hunters are?” he asked.
Bird Dog IV turned an optic cataract on the HC chief and answered brokenly, “Put them down on buckeye spoor. Routine procedure. Covered eleven hundred miles. No sign. Their beacons are silent.”
Walter might wonder—but Moon and Moses knew.
To forget was easy in cow country. Other follicular phases crossed their path and delayed their travels. Flavors changed with the latitude. Hunters came and went—occasionally enjoying their Molecular Reward—occasionally they themselves becoming hunted. By winter Moses had covered over a thousand miles with old man Moon, Dan and Toothpick. Moses felt his body harden—skin, dark—soles, thick—endurance, strong. Toothpick sent him up trees and across canals frequently. They worked like a unit now, surviving.