They would certainly eat tender fourteen-year-old colonists.
Jessica's voice wafted from somewhere in the bushes. "Just a little closer, Carey... "
Carey, stark naked, terribly alone, looked back into the brush. He would be blinded by the torches, unable to see anything.
Justin remembered his first grendel hunt. He hadn't been alone, but there hadn't been a backup team behind him either. He'd waded into the water, going slowly, feeling stark terror, but more too. Carey would be feeling that now.
Stark terror. Anger. Fear. And excitement, because if the grendel came and he survived, he would be a man.
Naked except for the grendel gun, shivering with the cold, Carey took another step toward the water-
And then the water parted. Something glided from its depths. A black destroyer. A fanged shadow. A thing of terror and appetite, made flesh. It blinked slowly, placidly at the naked creature trembling before it, and took a lazy step.
Carey shifted his rifle at the first disturbance. The kid was quick.
Skinny, but quick. Justin was already sighting-
Carey screamed, aimed, and fired. The grendel gun bucked, and a splash of Day-Glo orange splayed across the grendel's snout. The grendel blurred, flying toward Carey at heart-stopping speed. Carey fired again, and shouted, "Oh, sleet!"
Another long second, and the marrow had to be freezing in his veins. Perhaps the first bitter words of condemnation and a forlorn prayer were beginning to form on his lips...
Then fire flared in the darkness behind the torches. Three shots almost as one. A quarter second later, a fourth shot. Then the grendel was hit six, seven, eight times, slammed by heavy-caliber slugs that fried its nervous system, turned its assault into a leaping spasm, splashing toward the paralyzed Carey, who seemed to be watching the entire tableau in slow motion.
He staggered to the left as the grendel thundered to earth. It was on its side, its projected prey forgotten now. Alive, but in an awful agony as its own speed sacs overloaded. A quarter ton of amphibian death clawed at the ground, screaming, chasing its own tail in diminished circles, tearing up earth and rock and grass there in the half circle of the firelight, its dying hiss burning their ears...
Steam rose from its body. Its claws and tail trembled, twitched, and were still at last.
Carey turned back to look at them as they emerged from the shadows. Jessica hung back, her motion sensors wary for additional predators. They were pretty certain about this-only one momma per hole. But grendels had surprised them before.
Not this time, but it had happened.
"You... bastards," Carey said. Panting, he flung his rifle down on the ground. Pitiful in his nakedness, he had clearly wet himself, but was unconscious of it.
"You incredible bastards." He took another breath, and held it. This was a critical moment. He looked back at the grendel. Justin remembered the first time they had done this, and what the kid had said afterward. There had been no one to do this for him-he was one of the eldest Star Born, and no Earth Born even dreamed that something like the Grendel Run was going on. None of the Earth Born would do something so risky... and so much fun.
But he knew that Carey was looking at them. And the rifles, and then at the grendel. And remembering the incredibly short pause before the grendel was blown back into the water. Less than a second. Time enough to lose control of his bladder. Time enough to feel more naked and defenseless than he had ever imagined a human being could feel. Time enough to experience the incredible precision required by a kill team.
Carey looked at them and swallowed. He knew somehow that his entire reputation for machismo rested upon what he said next.
"Well..." He strained to sound casual. He bent, picked up his rifle. He walked toward them until he was standing three feet from Justin. He extended the rifle with his left hand. Justin extended his own right to take it-and Carey hit him, quite hard and very quickly, with his right fist, just under the left ear.
Justin stumbled back, tripped, and went down.
Finally Carey smiled. "That was... pretty fair shooting." He watched Justin carefully.
Justin pushed himself up to a sitting position. He felt his jaw tenderly. "Got a pretty good right there, kid." And held up his hand.
Carey took it and yanked him up, then stood with his legs slightly apart, well balanced. His lopsided grin was challenging. "Hendrick's a good coach," he said. Justin nodded. No action. A great sigh seemed to go through them all, a release of tension.
"You'd have got him, you know," Justin said. "It was a good hit."
"Why the hell do you do that?" Carey asked.
"It's fun," Aaron said.
Justin frowned. "We had a kid panic once. Nobody got shot, but it was close."
"Why paint? Cassandra would know if I hit—oh."
"Heh. Cassandra doesn't know about this. Jesus, can you imagine what Zack would do?"
They all laughed.
"So who panicked?"
Justin looked at him and shook his head.
"Edgar," Aaron said.
Carey smiled knowingly.
"Got the grendel, though," Justin said.
Carey coughed politely. "Who's got my clothes? My nuts are freezing."
Heather sashayed out of the dark. "Here's a blanket," she said sweetly. The blanket was wrapped around her. When she opened it, there was nothing underneath but Heather.
Carey swallowed hard. It wasn't certain, but the good bet was that Carey was still a virgin. Well, this evening would see the end of that onerous burden.
Heather wrapped the blanket around the both of them, and Carey became very, very involved in a kiss. Amid the general cheering, the two of them retreated from the firelight.
Aaron grinned. "Today I am a man," he said.
"Indeed. Now. Jessica-any other ghoulies about?"
"No grendel-sized heat sources. Let's harvest some samlon."
By the time they got back to Heorot, Tau Ceti was rising over the mountains.
Mercifully, the day was set for lazing and play. Carey Lou managed to stagger to his tent and collapse. Or at least they assumed that he was collapsing. Heather was with him, and the more Justin thought about it, the more he was convinced that a fourteen-year-old libido just might be impervious to fatigue, fear, and a thorough workout by the (rumor had it) inexhaustible Miss McKennie.
Ah, youth.
The day passed quickly, samples were gathered and catalogued, lessons on wildlife and herbology were taught by the elder Scouts, and a considerable amount of skinny-dipping, impromptu tree-climbing competitions, and general hell-raising continued through the day.
When evening finally fell again, there was a pleasant air of fatigue settling over the camp. They had shared two extremely alive days. Carey had also learned that three other Biters had suffered as he had. He was a member of a fraternity now, and he was already relishing the thought of passing that favor to one of the younger kids in a few years. Say, his younger brother Patrick...
The cook fires were burning, and soon dinner would be prepared. But there was another question still on the Biters' minds, and they had pestered their elders all day long.
Finally, Aaron sat them down, not a shred of playfulness in his attitude.
"All right," he said. "There's something serious we need to talk about tonight. Tonight, it's time that you learned things."