"Ghost. Come here, boy."
One second later a pair of glistening black eyes and a huge anvil-like head, wide muscular shoulders beneath, silently parted the leafy black ferns. Ghost didn't move as his dark animal gaze darted around the torn and trampled glade, rich with the scent of blood. From Hunter's aspect alone, he seemed to recognize that there was no battle to be fought.
Hunter smiled and shook his head. Then he turned to examine the gutted carcass of the grizzly. Its intestines, liver, and heart were gone. And the massive injury wasn't slashed into the massive chest, it was torn, as if inflicted in some demoniacal killing rage. Then Hunter examined the great bear's huge neck and head and found a large indentation in the inch-thick skull. Gingerly, he ran his hand over the depression, attempting to feel through the armorlike fur, before he was certain.
Part of the grizzly's skull had been crushed into powder. Slightly larger than a man's fist, the area ground jagged slices of bone beneath Hunter's probing grasp before he leaned back, shaking his head in amazement that approached disbelief.
Hunter was accustomed to death; it was the way of the wild, the way of his life. And he himself could kill efficiently and without emotion when necessary. And if he hadn't possessed that hard discipline, and will, and skill, the forest would have long ago claimed him. For in the end, always, the strongest survived.
He knew that a grizzly would eat anything, plant or animal or fish or bark or even rotten meat, to sustain its great bulk. Nor did it suffer any adverse effects from the combination. Grizzlies were, quite simply, gigantic garbage disposals. Which is why they rarely challenged large animals; they simply didn't need such quantities of meat when the entire forest was alive with plenteous sustenance.
Reaching out with the Bowie, Hunter made a larger incision in the stomach and, turning his face from the gastric vapors released, methodically pulled out five handfuls of half-digested berries and the shredded, bony remains of at least six fish, all eaten within the last twenty-four hours.
The bear had obviously been gorging itself, as bears habitually did in late summer and fall to produce the huge layers of fat that would sustain them through hibernation and the harsh winter.
Hunter knew that it would have eaten omnivorously for another two months before it bedded down in what most called hibernation but which was really little more than a long and often interrupted sleep. Even with the protective foldings of fat, it would awaken daily to meander in its den for warmth. It would often clean itself or even spend hours staring into the snow to alleviate boredom, waiting and watching for the first signs of spring. Just as it would stoically endure hunger as its body began utilizing the fat for sheer survival.
Hunter knew what blow had probably killed the beast, though he found it difficult to believe. And, despite his resolute courage, Hunter felt his chest tighten. His skin felt chilled and the hairs along his arms and neck seemed to rise.
He had been gauging this creature's strength all along, but not yet had he seen any act that could approach this. This was monstrous. This was something he had never seen and never imagined. What had done this had no predator. What had done this stood at the top of evolution. Stood where even man himself was simply food; a puny, dying thing.
Unmoving, raising his face only, Hunter stared into the distant forest and searched, knowing he would find nothing. Deep within, he knew a semblance of a fear he had felt many times, but this time it was joined by something else. Something he refused to accept or recognize, because he knew it would make him weak.
Hunter stood slowly, his brow hardening beneath his ragged black mane as his blue eyes narrowed and hardened degree by degree until they were as opaque as a leopard crouching before an attack. Some instinct he had long ago come to trust told him battle was here, and there was no escape. It was instinct, or more, that he had come to know true.
Then he felt Ghost beside him, the great wide shoulders rising almost to his hips.
"Let's go, boy." Hunter ruffled the wolf's neck hair. "We've got some bad news for our friends."
Takakura seemed unfazed.
Holding his MP-5 in a strong hand, the Japanese stared at the slaughtered bear. His face revealed nothing but defiance and determination. He stood a long time in silence as Hunter described what had obviously happened.
"The bear came from the brush, as they generally do," Hunter continued uneasily. "It was probably surprised. Was probably just defending itself. But it was flat ground, and this creature moved faster." He motioned from a point in the brush to the body of the dead grizzly. "They started there and they never quit. And it was probably a hard fight. Neither of them backed up, and they threw a lot of blows. The bear wounded it, I think, 'cause I found its blood on the trees. But right here the thing took it to the ground, got on top, and struck it hard in the head. Crushed its skull like a grape. Then it tore out its heart."
Takakura looked up. "Tore out its heart?"
Heavy pause.
"That was for pleasure, Commander." Hunter was expressionless. "It had already killed it."
Silent, Takakura looked to the rest of the squad.
Then Tipler, moving up from the edge, muttered almost to himself, "Damned peculiar, I must say… Yes, very peculiar…"
"What is it, Professor?" Hunter asked, attempting to conceal a faint depression he felt at this latest discovery.
"These, my boy," Tipler said with keen interest as he bent over the corpse. He lifted a short stick, pointing to wounds on the front section of the grizzly's behemoth shoulders. "These," he murmured, "are holding marks, my boy. Not slashing marks. Which means…"
Hunter stared a moment, eyes narrowing. Beneath the grizzly's armorlike fur he had not noticed the dissimilarity of the multitude of ravaging wounds torn into the shoulders. "Yeah," he muttered, his own interest fired by the acute observation. "Yeah, I know what it means."
"Well, don't feel like you have to tell the rest of us," Taylor said, stepping up. "The only thing we have to lose is our lives."
Tipler continued, becoming more excited as he confirmed his observation. "Yes, yes, not for ten thousand years has there been a beast that killed as this. Not since Smilodon." He pointed and turned to the group. "You see! It was on the bear's back" — carried away with the drama, he raised his hands as claws—"holding tightly with its great massive claws deeply embedded in the shoulders, ravaging its neck from behind! And it was then that it raised its hand in the air and brought it down to crush its skull! Remarkable! Such strength! I have never seen its equal! A Smilodon would have embedded its incisors meant for slashing and holding, to kill as it held. But this creature was forced to use a somewhat hammer-like blow" — he began to pace in his excitement—"which tells us that its fangs, or whatever semblance of canine attributes it may possess, are not formidable or sufficient for this manner of physical confrontation. However, it does possess strength not in proportion to its already established physical weight. Strange, yes." He paused, staring down. "The mystery deepens, but this creature's rage reveals it. No, it is not a tiger, not a creature with customary predatory attributes. Yet even so, it is still to be feared. Its most formidable weapons may be somewhat conventional, but they are nevertheless deadly in effect."
Taylor mumbled, "Well, then, why don't we just give it a bleeping medal?"
Takakura turned his head. "Taylor," he said reprovingly. Then, to the professor: "Which means what, exactly?"
Tipler stepped slightly back. "Which means, Commander, that this creature kills in a strangely similar fashion to Smilodon — the saber-toothed tiger — which has been absent from the planet for millennia. Yet it walks as a man, and appears to think sometimes as a man. Which leaves yet another possibility to us."