A Dawn of Mammals Collection Read online

  “Corner it where? Except for the cave itself, there aren’t any corners.” He pointed to the vast prairie, and its golden grasses, stirring in the breeze.

  She watched the patterns the wind made in the grass. Like ocean waves, almost. “It’s beautiful in its way, isn’t it?”

  “This world? Yeah.”

  “Beautiful and savage,” she said.

  “Terrifying and lonely,” he said.

  “Mmm. You have eleven roommates. But I know you miss your family.”

  “A lot.” He pressed his lips together. “I know they’re okay. My wife is the most competent and organized person ever. And my kids are grown and settled down. But I wish I was back there with them.”

  She nodded. Not that she felt the same way, but she was showing him she was listening.

  “Hey, Mr. O’Brien,” said Garreth, coming back from a trip to the latrine with Ted, who had also been out on the trap run. “Got the skin yet?” They’d been trying to cure the skins with urine and brains, and through trial and error, they were approaching a workable tanning process.

  Hannah said. “Sorry. I’m falling down on the job.” She took her knife out and began to skin the creature. She had no idea what it was either. At least four pounds of meat, though. “At least we have food for tonight.”

  “Lucky. We have to solve the theft problem,” said Bob.

  “You know my idea,” she said.

  “What?” Ted asked.

  “Let’s wait until everybody is back. We’ll talk about it as a group.”

  Two hours later, the meat was cooking over the fire, and everyone was seated around it. Bob told the story of the raided traps, and Hannah said that she thought it might be the saber tooth doing the raiding.

  M.J. said, “I don’t know. It could be anything. Dogs, bear dogs, the Hyaenodon.”

  “So maybe we should hunt them all. Get rid of the predators in this area, so we’re the only ones left.”

  Claire said, “That means no more scavenging from another animal’s kill, though.”

  “That’s right,” said Nari, who still didn’t like the idea of killing with her own hands. Scavenging, she could accept. She’d never managed to eat organ meats, either.

  M.J. said, “We might be able to kill dogs, or even the saber tooth. But I don’t think we could kill a Hyaenodon. They’re too big. So we can go after them, but we’ll have a hard time catching them, and they might not be our thieves anyway.”

  Rex said, “I think we should go after the saber tooth first.”

  “Why?” M.J. said, surprised.

  “You didn’t see the attack yesterday. I was there. It stalked us, and stalked us, and we’re lucky we came away from that with nothing more than one wounded.” He shook his head. “Without making that bunch of rocks, one of us—maybe two—would be dead.”

  Claire said, “I think that one has it out for Hannah. I’m smaller, but it went for her.”

  “I doubt that,” M.J. said.

  Claire said, “I don’t. You weren’t there.”

  Just what Hannah had said to Bob.

  “Okay,” said M.J., “but if we do go after it, how?”

  Bob said, “I was pointing out, if we try to corner it, we need a corner. It can sprint three times the speed of any of us. So we need to pin it.”

  “Or encircle it,” Garreth said.

  There was a silence as everyone thought about a strategy for going after the saber tooth. A log in the fire popped, sending out sparks onto Jodi that she absentmindedly brushed off.

  Hannah said, “I have an idea.”

  “What?” Bob said.

  “Use me as bait.”

  Chapter 44

  “What?”

  “No.”

  “Absolutely not,” Bob said.

  “Look. Maybe I’m crazy, but Claire agreeing with me makes me think maybe I’m not. That animal has a—a fixation on me.”

  Bob said, “It’s probably your imagination. Just normal, sensible fear. But it’s making your imagination go wild.”

  “Irrespective of that,” she said, “it’s a way to get the animal to come someplace. A place we’ve prepared. Maybe by a pit trap.”

  “We could climb trees and jump on it,” Ted said.

  M.J. scoffed. “The nimravid wouldn’t be fooled by that. And it can climb trees, I’m sure.”

  “We’ve never seen it climb,” said Zach.

  “But it surely can. You want to be up in a tree and have it come for you, instead of for Hannah?”

  Bob said, “I don’t want it going for Hannah.”

  She said, “I’d rather have it coming when I was ready for it than when I wasn’t.”

  “If we could come in after it, go at it with spears,” said Ted, “maybe we could drive it into the pit. Throw rocks, leap at it and back up. Confuse it.”

  “I’ll stay right by the pit,” Hannah said. “And I’ll have a spear myself.”

  “No,” Bob said, “absolutely....” But then a dreamy look came over his face.

  “That looks like a light bulb going off.”

  Bob said, “What if we took all our cordage, and braided a rope, and tied it around you. And you’re under a tree limb. And it comes, and two people are up there and haul you out of harm’s way?”

  “But that puts anyone else going for it into harm’s way,” M.J. said. “She’s dangling from a tree, so she’s safe. Six people running in throwing rocks and jabbing with spears aren’t.”

  Hannah filed that for later consideration. She said, “I wonder if I sat there and mewled, like a hurt kitten, if it would draw it. Or I could just tear the scabs off my leg. Smell like blood. Easy prey.”

  Nari said, “Oh, why can’t it just leave us alone?”

  Rex said, “It’s following its nature. That’s all. It isn’t personal, not really. For some reason, it might want Hannah more than the rest of us.”

  Bob peered at her. “Sorry for the personal question, but you’re not menstruating right now?”

  She shook her head. Something else she’d had to help the teenage girls deal with this past month. But no, that wasn’t why it wanted her.

  Ted said, “It recognizes her as a leader. Take out the leader, and the followers are easier to get to from then on.”

  M.J. said, “That’s not how predators work. You’re projecting human thinking onto it. It takes the weakest, the smallest. Nari or even Zach would be a better choice.”

  “Thanks,” Zach said. “Appreciate it.”

  M.J. said, “I wasn’t wishing for it to happen. Just saying, that’s how the nimravid is thinking, if it’s thinking at all. Their brain cases aren’t that large.”

  Hannah said, “I want to do it. Maybe it isn’t out to get me. Maybe it isn’t stealing from our traps. But it’s a danger. That animal is going to go for one of us, and I’m afraid one day when our guard isn’t up, it will succeed. I don’t want to die, and I don’t want to lose Nari or Zach or any of you. Period.”

  Ted said, “I’m with Hannah. The best defense is a good offense.”

  Rex said, “I think you have that backward. But I’m not disagreeing. Maybe it is best to attack, not defend.”

  Claire said, “If you attack once successfully, then your days of needing to defend are over.”

  Jodi nodded, and then so did Garreth.

  Bob said, “I feel really sad right now.”

  Hannah was surprised to see tears in his eyes. “Why?”

  “Because you guys are just kids. You should be worried about dates, and your driver’s license test, and the popular kid who snubbed you at the pool. Not this. Not...warfare.”

  Garreth said, “Kids our age have been involved in every war there ever was. And at least this isn’t some stupid war over mineral rights or religion. It’s not political. It’s a fight for survival.”

  Nari said, “Can you find something for me to do that isn’t stabbing it? I’ll be lookout, or throw rocks.”

  Hannah turned to the girl. “But you�
�re willing to help?”

  She nodded. “I saw your claw marks when we went to the latrine this morning. And I’ve seen Jodi’s. I don’t want to be next.”

  Chapter 45

  They talked about it all through dinner, and beyond, while they were lying on the straw mattresses in the dark cave. Ideas were pitched, rejected, adapted. And finally they had a plan. It might not work. If they were lucky—good and lucky—it might.

  What Hannah liked best about it was that she was the person at most risk. She did not want to die in the grip of the saber tooth, but even less did she want any of the teenagers to die.

  The next morning, they were ready to go. M.J. was skeptical but willing to go along with the plan. Bob’s face was etched with lines of worry that seemed to deepen every time he glanced Hannah’s way.

  They worked together at the pit trap they had chosen for the ambush. First, some of the shorter spears were taken into the pit and dug into it, points up. Garreth knew the name for them: “Punji sticks,” he said. “Used in the Vietnam war, among others.”

  “Where do you keep all that info?” Hannah asked him, helping him to collect rocks at the stream.

  “I like history. I mean, science is cool too, but history is my thing.” He glanced over his shoulder. “You won’t tell Mr. O’Brien that?”

  She zipped her lips. “I promise.”

  “Aren’t you scared?”

  She said, “Pretty much every minute of every day here, yeah.”

  He laughed. “No.”

  “Yeah,” she said.

  “But you seem so brave.”

  “So are you. Every one of you is brave. A lot of kids, put them in this situation, and they’d fall apart. Curl into a little ball and cry for weeks.”

  “You really think so?”

  “I really think so. If I keep your secret, will you keep one of mine?”

  He nodded, wide-eyed.

  “I don’t, without qualification, love teenagers.” She smiled. “But I feel I lucked out with this group of you. You’re special. And I’m glad I got the chance to get to know you.”

  “Um, Hannah?”

  “What, hon?”

  “This isn’t like your farewell speech, is it?”

  “I hope not.” She offered up a smile, trying to make it a reassuring one. “I believe we can trap this beast. And our lives will be better for it. Safer.”

  “Okay. So it’s worth the risk?”

  “Absolutely.” She made herself sound more certain than she was. As the bait to the trap, she was feeling nervous. “Let’s get these over to the trap, and then I’ll check in with Nari.” She was keeping a lookout to the north for the saber tooth.

  They had their traps all into place. But then they had to wait. Some of them were waiting in trees. Some were hunkered down in the streambed, ready to run up. Others were in a dense thicket of bushes, trying not to move because there were thorns in some of the bushes, and every movement got them scratched.

  Hannah had been resting, her eyes closed, next to the pit trap. She was thinking about her life. About her family, and the pain of those memories. Her sister, her mother. About her high school years. College, such a relief to get away from home. Her first serious boyfriend at college, a sweet kid she probably should have stayed with. Friends, their faces flashing through her mind one by one. Dreams unfulfilled. Regrets. Embarrassing moments—which were so plentiful, she could sit there until nightfall and think of nothing else. Great meals. Times she’d laughed so hard with friends she’d about peed herself.

  She was smiling at one such memory when Nari came bursting through the grove, saying, “I see it. It’s out there.”

  “Okay,” Hannah said, surprised at how calm she suddenly was. “You get across the stream, to the south. Tell them to get ready.” She tilted her head up. “Everyone up there hear that?”

  Rustling came from the trees, and soft calls of “Yeah.”

  She brushed herself off and walked from the woods and up the rise. She stood there and scanned the horizon.

  There it was, weaving in and out of the grass.

  She waved to it.

  It froze. Then its head turned, and it looked at her.

  “So,” she said quietly. “Here I am again. Let’s do this. Come and get me.”

  It turned and looked away, the way it had been looking before. It must have had some other prey in mind.

  “Hey!” she said. “I’m bigger! Tastier!” She laughed at herself. Like it understood that. “Ow!” she said, and fell down, trying to sound like a wounded animal, whimpering. How had the oreodont sounded when it had been attacked? She tried a high-pitched scream, and rolled around, like she was fatally injured. She felt like half a fool, but when she propped herself up on her elbows, she saw it.

  It was coming this way. As she watched, it broke into a trot.

  Chapter 46

  She wanted to leap up and run away. She wasn’t calm now. Her heart was stuck in her throat.

  But she made herself push herself up slowly, and then, with an exaggerated limp, she went back down the hill. She turned her head just as she would lose sight of it, and it was still coming, fast.

  She scampered back to the shade under the trees. “It’s coming!” she yelled, and she blinked her eyes, trying to get them adjusted to the shade again. She hurried over to her spot, just beyond the pit trap. They had laid leafy branches over it, ones with thin wood and lots of leaves, to disguise it. If she was lucky, it would come right toward her and fall in, and it would be over that quickly.

  She skirted the trap, lay down, got her spear in one hand and her knife in the other. She began to whimper again to lure the animal, and it was pretty easy to do, because she wanted to whimper from the fear.

  Just do this once, right. And we can be free of this monster.

  There was a human hiss from above her, a warning, perhaps. For here came the saber tooth, stalking, coming toward her.

  She squeaked. Her hand began shaking around her knife.

  The saber tooth took another step. And another. It made a chuffing sound.

  Get it over with. If you’re going to kill me, do it fast.

  It paused, looking at her. She could smell it. She could smell herself as well, as nervous sweat broke out all over her body.

  A sound came from above, barely audible to her.

  The saber tooth’s head snapped up. He knew something was up there. He snarled.

  “Let’s do it!” she yelled, and got up and scampered backward, trying to draw the animal into the pit trap.

  Around her, the most athletic of the kids fell from the trees, ropes around them pulling them up short before they hit the ground. They’d tied good knots, but quick-release ones, and she watched Ted then Claire then Garreth then Rex slip the last foot or two to the ground as they released themselves.

  They came as one, from four directions, yelling and thrusting the spears at the animal. From behind her, Bob and M.J. came running up, shouting, armed with rocks.

  The saber tooth wheeled, confused at so many enemies—or targets.

  It stopped, turned to look at her, and leapt, right across the pit trap, as if it had known all along it was there. Straight at her.

  She screamed for real and pushed her spear at it.

  Bob and M.J. came forward, throwing rocks, yelling. The four kids with spears were right behind it.

  “Watch the trap!” Bob yelled at them.

  She could hear the others coming out from their hiding places in the bush and up the stream bank behind her. Soon, it would be surrounded.

  They had a chance. If they could close the circle and drive it into the trap.

  “All right!” said Ted. “It’s going to work!”

  The saber tooth leapt then. Maybe it had seen an opening. Maybe it had randomly chosen one of them.

  It flew ten feet through the air.

  Hannah flinched. But it wasn’t going for her. It hit M.J. full force, knocking him down. Then it bit, quicker than t
hought, and she heard the snap of a bone.

  M.J. went still. Too still. The saber tooth snarled at all of them and grabbed M.J. by his neck and pulled him away.

  Everyone had frozen at the attack. Now Nari began to scream, frantically. “Shush!” Bob said. “Don’t draw him to you.”

  “Let’s get him,” Ted said. He ran for the animal.

  “Another one!” called Zach. “There’s another!”

  The second nimravid came from nowhere, it seemed. In a second, it was right behind Garreth. “Move, Garreth!” she screamed.

  His head whipped around and he stumbled backward. Ted took a step and steadied Garreth, and they managed to avoid falling into the pit. But the saber tooth lashed out and caught them both with a claw.

  “Shit,” said Garreth.

  “I’m okay. Barely touched me,” said Ted, but he stuck his hand in his mouth just after he said it.

  “Defensive position,” Bob said. “Everyone together, in a tight circle.”

  The second saber tooth was intent on them, ignoring the one dragging M.J. away.

  They crowded together, keeping their spears out, and kept pushing the weapons at the second saber tooth. It circled them. Their own circle moved in response, the stronger people trying to stay in front, the weaker ones protected.

  Bob was the only one throwing rocks. They bothered the animal more than the futile lunges with the spears. Hannah said, “We need to throw at it. People in the back, pass your rocks up.”

  Claire edged around, taking a forward position, and began throwing too. Laina did. Hannah felt her hand pulled back and someone tried to push a handful of rocks into it. She dropped the spear to take them and hurled them, one by one, at the unhappy animal.

  It took forever to drive it away, but drive it they did. Hannah supposed no more than three minutes had passed since M.J. was hit, but it felt a lifetime had.

  “M.J.,” said Jodi. “Where is he?”

  She turned and saw the path through the leaves, where the first saber tooth had dragged him. “Everybody, stay together. Watch every direction.”

  “We’ll save him,” said Laina.

  Hannah thought it was too late for that, but they had to try. They followed the trail out to the grasses. The saber tooth was bent over M.J.