They initiated both, Nen into the pack and Stivik as a pack organisation person type thing.
Thanks for the reply
I was beginning to think no one would appear this week. But thanks dude! It's Saturday, so...
Chapter 4
Two days later the six sligs were packing their equipment into the jeep while Nen stared at the steering wheel nervously, trying to remember something of his driving lessons.
“Remember, don’t hurt her,” Steinix, a particularly gangly vykker wearing a white lab coat told them for about the fiftieth time. “She represents a significant investment for us and we won’t pay you anything if she’s brought in dead.”
Tilic, who had humoured him the first forty five times, now gave him a particularly humourless look. “This is not the first crossbreed we’ve been commissioned to bring in you know. We’re good at our job.”
Steinix looked at them doubtfully, as if he thought bringing in sligs to do the job at all was a bad idea.
The six sligs had arrived the day before and had been immediately surprised to find only a handful of inhabitants working here when the place was so large. There were no more than 15, maybe 20 vykkers, and less than ten sligs, while the place consisted of over 20 square miles of land. There were ten of the crossbreeds, discounting the one they had been hired to track down, and they were all kept inside the building.
“Come on Nen,” Braz called cheerfully to the younger slig, who suddenly snapped out of his daze and switched on the jeep’s engine, which groaned loudly as Nen played with the gears.
The vykker winced.
The sligs finished loading their luggage and clambered onto the back of the vehicle. Burn got on last. Of the six of them he was the one feeling most nervous about the job, mainly because he was the only one of them who hadn’t been trained in tracking or fighting unpredictable wildlife. Nen braced himself and jammed his foot down on the pedal beneath the wheel. The jeep lurched forwards two metres, throwing the sligs backwards, and then settled down to an easy 20 miles per hour.
Steinix called after them, “
Please, try to be careful with her!”
“Does he mean the ‘breed or the jeep?” Braz muttered to Stivik, grinning.
Dekas stood up and called back to the vykker, “Sir, moolah or no moolah, say that to us one more time and you can go hunting for the thing yourself!”
Tilic gave him a lethal look while trying to conceal a grin.
Steinix looked indignant and marched back inside the building.
* * *
Thirty days later Tilic, Nen and Burn were knelt down on the edge of a slow-flowing river. “Finally,” Tilic muttered to himself.
From the jeep, parked ten metres away, Dekas called, “Is it what we’re looking for Tilic?”
“Yeah, and it’s fresh,” Tilic called back. Nen grinned and Burn managed a half-smile. The three of them were gathered around a set of footprints in the mud at the edge of the river. “Let’s get going. As soon as it realises we’re here it’ll be off, and if we don’t catch it by nightfall we probably won’t catch it.” It was late afternoon already and Tilic was frustrated that when they finally got on its trail there was such a great chance of losing it again. The three sligs headed back towards the jeep. Tilic knelt down and muttered to Nen, “Well done for spotting that. We could’ve been out here another thirty days if you hadn’t seen it.”
Nen looked embarrassed and replied, “It was nothing. I was just looking to make sure we weren’t too near the riverbank and there it was.”
The three of them piled into the machine. Nen took his place behind the wheel and soon they were moving quickly through the trees. Ten minutes later they emerged from the forest onto a meadow of long grass. As they left the trees and roared out into the grass, Braz, looking back, suddenly shouted, “There, look!”
“Shhh,” Stivik hissed, but looked back with the rest of them. There was a hollow under a fallen tree on the edge of a wood and it was clear some animal had been lying there.
“Stop us, Nen,” Tilic said so he could only just be heard over the rumbling engine. The jeep stopped and Tilic leapt out, this time alone, and ran to the hollow. “This is nothing I recognise, so I think we’ve got it! And it’s fresh; it can’t have left here more than two minutes ago!”
Suddenly Stivik, forgetting his own advice, yelled, “Look!” Tilic turned and followed Stivik’s pointing hand to see, for half a second, a narrow, short head silhouetted against the darkening sky, then it was gone as the animal crossed the ridge and started running away from them.
“That’s it! Nen, go!” Tilic chased after them as the engine growled. He leapt towards the jeep just as it started moving. Hanging onto the back, he tried unsuccessfully to pull himself up until Burn and Dekas grabbed him by the arms and dragged him on.
They reached the top of the ridge 30 seconds later and looked down the grassy slope. In the growing darkness Tilic could just see a patch of shaking grass about halfway down the slope and towards the trees beyond. “If it gets to the forest we’ll of lost our chance,” Stivik hissed to him. Tilic nodded, grabbed a tranquiliser gun from the bundles in the bottom of the jeep and stood up.
Trying to aim the gun while standing in the shaking, swaying machine was all but impossible. Tilic did his best, knowing he was expected to take this shot and get it right. For a second the rattling of the jeep was slightly less and he spotted a flash of green skin among the grass, illuminated for a second by the jeep’s headlights. He squeezed the trigger of his gun.
The shot went too high, whipping through the grass three or four metres ahead of the ‘breed. Tilic swore and barely had time to think about taking a second attempt when a gunshot sounded right past his ear. He jumped and almost fell over. Ahead of them the animal shrieked as the shot hit it. Tilic swung round quickly to see Stivik lowering a gun from his shoulder. Tilic looked at him, surprise across his face. Stivik grinned and said, “Well it wasn’t exactly a small target!”
Suddenly Nen shouted from the front of the jeep, “Guys, its changed direction.”
Tilic looked round. The patch of shaking grass was now moving parallel to the edge of the forest. “The tranquiliser must be disorientating it,” And then muttered to Stivik, “Why didn’t you tell me you could shoot like that?”
Stivik gave him a look of mock-surprise, “Why, can’t everybody?”
Tilic rolled his eyes and looked out ahead of them to see the patch of grass stop moving. “That’s it, stop nearby Nen. Not too close, it might still be awake.”
The jeep stopped and they piled out. Dekas grabbed a torch and shone it towards the creature. They couldn’t see it through the grass but they could hear it growling. Suddenly there was a thwack and Braz flew backwards through the air. “Keep your distance,” Tilic yelled, “Let the tranquiliser take effect!”
They crouched in the darkness while Burn checked on Braz. He was winded and bruised, but nothing was broken. A minute went past before the growling stopped. Dekas whispered, “Wait another minute. It might be faking.” Tilic nodded in agreement and none of them moved. Nen found he was hardly breathing.
Another two minutes went past. Slowly, almost silently Tilic edged forward towards the creature. The others watched with baited breath until they heard him shout, “Its ok. Its out like a sliglet.”
The others crowded round. Burn saw it and said immediately, “That’s not the one we came for. It’s bigger than the one in the picture, and it’s got more muscles.”
“It’s been out here a while, it could have put on weight, and got stronger,” Tilic suggested quietly.
“No,” Burn declared, “I’m sure it’s different. And I
think this one’s male.”
“And since when were you the ultimate expert on crossbreeds?” Braz demanded.
Tilic barked. “Dekas, go get the picture from the jeep. Give your torch to someone.”
Dekas shoved the torch into Nen’s hand and ran back to the jeep. Stivik moved closer to the unconscious crossbreed and gently touched a scar running down the thing’s side. “Well this one looks like its been in a few fights either way.”
“Get back from it,” Tilic ordered. He was starting to feel uneasy.
Dekas quickly returned with the picture of the escaped animal they had been given by the vykkers. Tilic took it, ushered Nen over with the torch and examined first the picture and then the animal. “Burn’s right. The skin colour’s different,
and this one’s got more spikes than the one in the picture.”
Dekas swore, “All that work and we get the wrong one.”
“But it’s the same species,” Nen pointed out. “I mean the same… well, whatever. I guess they must have lost this one a long time ago. Surely they’ll be glad to have him back?”
“But how glad?” Dekas said darkly. His thoughts were with their pay.
“Burn, get the radio from the jeep and see if you can get it working. I want to talk to those vykkers. Stivik, get some rope and see if you can tie its legs together or something.” Stivik nodded and the two of them left. A minute later Stivik and Braz started trying to work out the best way to tie up this particular creature.
Burn was fiddling with the radio when they heard a howl from the forest. The sudden noise made them all jump. “What was that?”
“You think there’s another of these things out here?”
“How many crossbreeds do you think are running around in these woods?” Braz asked scornfully.
Dekas answered, “Well we found this one where we expected to find the female. Maybe they met up out here.”
“Shut up,” Hissed Tilic, who now had the radio pressed against the side of his face. The box let out a crackle. “Yes? This is 66984…
Tilic, the… Yes, the scout leader… No, not her, we found a different one… No, the same species of crossbreed, but it’s bigger, we recon it’s a male… Yeah… We think the other’s close, we heard… No, it’s fine, unconscious but not hurt. Well, at least not by us… We haven’t seen the other…” Tilic suddenly grinned, “Alright… How long? Alright. We’ll wait here… Ok, don’t worry. We know what we’re doing… Great.”
Tilic lowered the radio and grinned at his pack mates. “It seems they’re glad to have this one back. They’ve agreed to pay us the full price for this one
and the same again if we can catch the female!” The other five gave him looks of surprise as they contemplated what they would do with all that moolah. “Listen, we don’t want to lose the other one now we’ve got it close, so Braz and I’ll stay here and look after this one. Dekas, Stivik, you guys lead the others and go after the female in our jeep. The vykkers said they’ve got a jeep nearby and they can pick up this one in an hour or two, and then we’ll come on and join you. Get us some guns and a radio out of the jeep and then get going.”
------------------------------------------
I wasn't quite happy with the ending of that chapter. It was getting rather long and I needed to bring it to a close and after much thought I decided this was the best place.
Replies are fun.