Ryerson’s hired hunters were spread out through the jungle, but they were not so unwise as to be in a position where the Ursa could pick them off one by one. Instead they were moving in groups of two, covering each other’s backs. To counteract the reputed camouflage abilities of the Ursa, each of their pulser rifles—nothing less would do the job—was equipped with a thermal sighting device. This should give the group a drop on any overconfident Ursa operating on the mistaken assumption that their camouflage would protect them.
“You closing in on one of the bastards, Silver?”
“I’m seeing definite signs, sir. Like right here.” He tapped a small pile of dirt in front of him.
Ryerson looked puzzled. “Like what there?”
“Ursa bury their feces. Makes them tougher to track, or presumably they think so. The result is little dirt mounds that look just like this. Also I’ve seen traces of what looks like the talons of an Ursa in the dirt. I could be wrong. It could be some other predator, one considerably less dangerous.”
“But you don’t believe that to be the case.”
“No, sir, I do not,” he said firmly.
“Good lad. Looks like I made the right choice,” Ryerson said with a degree of self-satisfaction. “You certainly know a great deal about them.”
“I read a lot,” he said, his voice flat. He paused and then said, “Mr. Ryerson, what are we doing out here? I mean, really? Are you—?”
“Am I what?” When Daniel didn’t respond immediately, Ryerson cracked a smile. “Did I just get a diagnosis from my doctor that my time’s up? Or am I terminally suicidal and depressed? Something like that?”
“Something like, yeah.”
“Sorry to disappoint you, son.” Ryerson thumped his chest. “But I’m in the pink of health. Nothing wrong, at least that I know of.”
“Then why?”
“Because it’s the next thing.”
“The next—?”
“The next thing I want to do. The next challenge that I could find. That’s how you get somewhere, son: by seeing what remains to be done and then doing it. I want to be the oldest non-Ranger who has ever managed to kill an Ursa. If you ask me—which admittedly no one did, but that’s never stopped me before—the Rangers are a bunch of arrogant, overconfident smug fools. Telling people where they can and can’t go. Acting as if they are our only hope against the Ursa. I believe in self-reliance, Silver. Never a big fan of having someone else doing things on my behalf when I never asked them to, and then acting as if I owe them all some huge debt of gratitude. To hell with the Rangers. If you want a dead Ursa, then do it yourself. That’s what I say.”
“Well, I’ll certainly do my best to help you achieve your goal.”
“And what about you?”
Daniel was continuing to study the ground and was only listening with half an ear. “What about me what?”
“Feeling better about the girl trying to push you out of her life?”
“I don’t care.”
“That’s the spirit!”
“No, you don’t understand.” He turned to look at Ryerson. “I don’t care about anything. I’m nothing without her. Hell, I was nothing with her.”
“Come on, Silver!” He chucked him on the shoulder. “Nothing good ever came from feeling sorry for yourself!”
I don’t feel sorry for myself. I don’t feel anything. That’s the point.
“You’re right, sir,” he said, trying his best to provide some degree of emotion to his voice. “I’ll try to remember th—”
That was when the deafening roar of the Ursa sounded through the clearing.
Ryerson jumped, startled. Daniel remained utterly calm, not providing any sort of visible reaction. To him, there was no reason for there to be any reaction. He had expected this the entire time. When you were leading people into the belly of the beast, there was no reason to be startled when the beast made its presence known. Indeed, he found Ryerson’s shock and alarm to be mildly entertaining. What did you expect, old man?
It was impossible to tell from which direction the animal’s defiant roar had originated as it echoed through the clearing. It seemed to be coming from all sides at once. Quickly Ryerson activated the wrist communications unit that would keep him in touch with his hunters. “Nickerson! Philips! Chang! Anyone! Report!”
The response was a babble of shouts, one overlapping the next.
“No sighting yet, but the foliage is rustling—”
“There’s definitely one of them out here—”
“Could be two or three!”
“Something’s moving!”
“I don’t see any—oh my God!”
Shots fired. A truncated scream.
“This is Vale! Creighton’s down! I saw it tear his head off!”
“Maintain position, Vale, we’re coming!”
“Screw that! I’m out of—!”
The second, higher-pitched scream, Vale’s, wasn’t preceded by any pulser blasts at all. He hadn’t managed to get off any shots. He’d only had time to die.
It was complete chaos. Ryerson was spinning like a top, hearing death and destruction all around him, not knowing in which direction to look. Another roar, two more screams. Marsh and Inigo, by the sounds of it. Ryerson had hired some of the best hunters on Nova Prime, and the Ursa—for what else could it be?—was picking them off effortlessly.
“What the hell is this thing?”
“I am not dying out here!” came a terrified declaration from Chang, right before he was proven wrong. He managed to get off three shots, a personal best for the group, before his death scream erupted over the comm unit.
Ryerson was encountering a severe depletion of nerve. His face was the color of curdled milk, his eyes wide with horror. He fired several random shots around him into the jungle. The only result that came over the comm unit was a startled yelp from what sounded like Nickerson, yelling, “I’m shot! What idiot shot me?” right before the roar of the Ursa sounded and Nickerson shrieked like a baby demanding to be fed. Then Nickerson’s comm unit went dead, along with Nickerson himself.
“Silver, do something! Get me out of here!” Ryerson’s voice was just above a whisper, his throat constricted. Everything was happening so quickly. It had been barely a minute since the Ursa had first made its presence known, and it was ripping through his entire hunting party with hellacious speed. Ryerson clearly hadn’t yet been able to fully grasp what was happening.
Daniel simply looked at him with bland disinterest. “What is it about having a lot of money that makes people feel they are invincible?”
Ryerson shook his head in denial. “If that’s what you thought, then why did you come? Are you suicidal?”
“No. Not especially.” Daniel shrugged.
Suddenly a tree at the outer edge of the clearing shattered into splinters and there was the Ursa towering over them, not ten feet away. Several pieces of human bone were lodged in its teeth, and its muzzle dripped with blood and gore.
In the face of his impending demise, Ryerson—to his credit—did not flinch. The shrieks and the cries of death all around him had been overwhelming when he was dealing with things he couldn’t see. Now that he was face-to-face with the foe, Ryerson rose to the occasion. It wasn’t bravery so much as it was pure, gut-roiling desperation as he dashed diagonally across the clearing, firing his pulser repeatedly. “Die, you son of a bitch, die!” he shrieked as he fired over and over again.