"But—"
"I'm too tired to play martinet, Cad. Do me a favor and just come back in."
The pond stared at him. Something about it made his stomach itch with tension. He wheeled the Skeeter around for a long look at the plateau. The brambles were struggling for a foothold on the square kilometer of naked rock, and Cadmann saw that yes, a trap could...
Suddenly he was smiling as he climbed, spun the Skeeter around and dived toward the lights of the Colony.
There were no colorful newsreels or densely worded technical briefs displayed on the walls of the communal meal hall. There were no sharp, tangy vegetable smells, and no warm buzz of camaraderie.
A low mutter of disgust tinged with fear wound its way through the group as they faced the floating image of the dead calf, its wounds marked with flashing green labels.
Mary Ann gripped Cadmann's hand; her nails bit into his palm every time the camera zoomed in on a wound, until he carefully disengaged her hand and put it firmly in her lap.
At the head table, Zack paused in his comments to take a drink. It seemed to brace him. Cadmann wondered what exactly was in that pitcher.
"This is our best reconstruction," he concluded, rather apologetically. "Sylvia extrapolated this from the spread and depth of the bite marks. We have an eighteen-centimeter jaw base, and a roughly wedge-shaped head. It looks like something sired upon a rattlesnake by a bear." Nobody laughed. "Um... massively strong jawbones and corresponding muscles.
"We can't be sure how much such an animal would weigh. Certainly enough to destroy any credibility the tracks by the chicken cages might have had." He peered out into the audience. "I'm afraid that that incident was a particularly unfunny prank."
Gregory Clifton handed a drowsy April to his wife, Alicia, and stood. "Zack, let's cut the crap. I worked on the computer map. Half the Colony saw the information as it was coming in. There isn't an adult here who can't interpret the technical data for himself. How about opening up the floor?"
The applause shook the room.
Zack shrugged, spreading his hands. "All right, Gregory—what's your idea?"
"We know about the pterodons. None of them get too large. But maybe there's another species of flying carnivore. Something the size of—oh, crap, let's say a California condor..."
There was a quick spate of derisive laughter. Jon Van Don yelled, "What the hell, why not a roc, Greg?"
Barney Carr-brayed with laughter. "Watch out for flying elephants!"
"Wing span-to-weight ratio, Greg," Stu called. "It would have to be huge to lift a calf. Much larger than a ground carnivore capable of bringing down the same size prey. And how would it evade the Skeeters?"
Greg held up his hand. "Hear me out. It wouldn't need to fly away with the calf. It could fly in, and then drag a heavy victim to a safe place.
And maybe it nests up in Mucking Great Mountain—"
There was a shout from the back of the auditorium, and Andy Washington, the big black man from the engineering crew, stood. He was fighting a losing battle with an evil grin. "I say our mistake is thinking it had to be big. Maybe it's not an it. Maybe it's a them, like a herd of Marabunta army mice—"
"Something like a glassfish," Jean Patterson added. "A super-chameleon—"
"It has to be coldblooded, to evade the infrared—"
"The hell it does! There're hot springs everywhere you look!" The opinions were flying too thick to stop now, and Zack sat back, pleased and relieved by the healthly creative energy being released.
La Donna Stewart stood, tiny fists poised lightly on her hips. "Has anybody considered a borer?"
"I think we're listening to one—Ow!" There was the sound of an affectionately brisk slap as she whacked her fiance, Elliot, and the room quieted for a moment.
"I mean like a mole, or like ants or termites. This entire area could be riddled with tunnels and we'd never know it. It could operate like a trapdoor spider. Engineering should put together a seismic detector, Zack..."
Andy whipped out a pad of paper and started making notes to himself.
Zack Moscowitz took the opportunity to grasp control again. "A good suggestion. La Donna. All good suggestions..." He glared at the engineer. "Except maybe the Marabunta mice, Andy."
He touched a switch, and the grotesque skull disappeared from the wall. He chuckled darkly. "I know that some of you don't even believe in this thing. There is... one possibility that Rachel suggested to me. As camp psychologist she felt it was time we discussed it openly."
He took another sip from the thermos, then plunged ahead, dead serious now. "We all know about Hibernation Instability. It's no joke to any of us. Personally, I've noticed that I don't parse as well as I once did. That I need a calculator for operations that I used to do in my head. And I wonder: is that just age? Or could it be those little ice crystals that weren't supposed to form?
"We've had major memory losses, impairment of motor skills, mood swings and clinical personality disorders—all of which we've been able to handle by juggling work duty and schedules. A few cases have required chemical stabilization."
The muttering in the room had quieted. They were ahead of him, and heads nodded in anticipatory agreement.
"Maybe things have been too placid here. The crops are thriving, we've had no deaths—hell, no real injuries—"
Cadmann looked around him in the dark. A little white lie there, Zack.
Ernst walked right of the cliff and broke his ankle his first week down.
"Just maybe there are those among us who feel that it's been too easy, and perhaps for our own good want to—" His fingers fluttered as he fought for the right words—"want to keep our guard up, our spines stiff, by creating a bogeyman. A harmless joke, perhaps, except that the loss of the dog, the chickens and now the calves suggests a rather disturbing trend.
"I won't suggest that this is what has happened. But I would be remiss to exclude the possibility from this discussion. So... if anyone has anything to talk about, please..."
He looked out over the audience, which was dead silent. Zack gripped the edge of the table, his knuckles pale. He moistened his lips nervously. Alicia's baby started to cry, and she blithely offered it a nipple.
Zack cleared his throat uncomfortably. "No one has anything to say? Carlos?"
Their carpenter/historian shook his head. He peered at his fingernails, inspecting them in the dark. "Not me, amigo. I uh... I heard that the tracks by the chicken cage might have been a prank. We all heard Cadmann say that, and I guess that's possible."
There was silence for another long moment, then Cadmann stood. His big hands were splayed out on the table in front of him, and his face was grim—not a shred of regret or admission or apology there. "I know what I think. I think that we're wasting our time here, talking about Hibernation Instability. That's bullshit. I have a good idea of what we're up against here: something that is fast and strong and smarter than a wolf. Smart enough to use the rivers and streams to foil other predators, maybe. At any rate, that's how it dumps the heat, and why we don't pick it up on the scans."
There was a murmur of approval, and Cadmann continued. "This thing is checking out our territory one bite at a time. I'm not trying to alarm anyone, but it's pretty obvious that our present defensive plans are insufficient."
Terry stood up, brows furrowed petulantly. "We're using standard procedures, Weyland. In fact, our patrols are heavier than the situation really warrants. We're taking people away from other projects."
"I agree, Terry. So let's not take them away for an indefinite period. I say an aggressive defense could handle this situation in a week."