Cluster (5 page)

Flint hadn't brought his own spear, and had no immediate use for his stone handax. The tool was good enough, but not against a standing dinosaur. His only advantage was his brain—and as the creature loomed larger, he was none too sure of that. But the job had to be done, and his perverse pride forced him to see it through, even at the risk of becoming the Chief's heir.

“Hee-ya, Snorthorn!” he cried loudly, waving his arms.

One moment the dinosaur was standing; the next, he was charging at a good twenty miles an hour. Or so it seemed.

There was only one response to such a charge: to get out of the way. Flint ran, straining his utmost, hearing the
thud thud thud
of Old Snort's tremendous hooves hammering the ground close behind.
Too
close behind; the animal could catch a man in full flight, and knew it.

Then Tsopi shot past, her tentacle looped down to touch her own body. From the small bearing came a piercing keening noise, as of an animal in terror.

Flint dodged to the side, caught his foot in a vine root, and sprawled headlong. The feet of the dinosaur smashed down—and missed him by a good yard. The turf sank several inches. Old Snort had seen him fall, but was unable to change course on such short notice—and Tsopi was buzzing along immediately ahead, commanding attention.

Flint got up, unhurt. He should have watched his feet better; now all the tribesmen would know of his clumsiness. But perhaps it was just as well, for he was obviously not the hero of this adventure. The Polarian was. Flint watched the chase with interest.

Tsopi approached the misnamed deadfall, dinosaur in galloping pursuit. The trap was a huge pit, ten feet deep and forty in diameter, covered by a network of crisscrossing vine stems. It was not concealed; dinosaurs' eyes were not so sharp, and their brains not so good as to decipher its menace before putting a foot in it. Natural hazards were one thing; natural selection had bred care. But artificial hazards were only a century old, on this world, and the dinosaurs had not had time to learn yet. All that had been necessary was to build it several weeks before the hunt, to give the man-smell time to wear thin. Old Snort would crash through the vine segments and fall in, and though his shoulder was two feet taller than the drop, his mass and musculature were such that he would not be able to climb out. Forward propulsion was not the same as upward movement, as the Polarian's problem with climbing showed.

Suddenly Tsopi veered away from the pit, followed of course by Old Snort. Both skirted the edge, and the dinosaur did not fall in.

“The alien fool!” the man next to Flint exclaimed. “Why didn't he go
over
it, the way we planned?”

Why not, indeed? Had the Polarian deliberately sabotaged the hunt?

Now they were looping back: toward the men. Tsopi accelerated right at Flint. If old Snort continued on his course—well, they could scatter, but one or more men would be tramples.

“Plint!” Tsopi cried, her tentacle touching the ground. “I cannot cross the trap at speed!”

Then Flint realized his mistake. A man would have bounded from one vine to the other automatically, safely, but the Polarian could not jump. Not that way. The crisscrossing vines were an impassable menace.

“Move toward it, then dodge aside!” Flint cried. “Old Snort can't turn as fast as you can.”

“Right!” The Polarian looped about again, and such was the concentration of the dinosaur that he charged right by Flint without seeing him. One-track body, one-track mind.

But Old Snort was slowing; he could not maintain charge speed for long. That would complicate the trap; he might lose interest in the uncatchable alien and turn to the slower men. “Let him follow close!” Flint called. And wondered how it was the earless Polarian could hear him.

Tsopi eased off, letting the dinosaur catch up. They headed back toward the covered pit, the small form almost merging with the large one.

“Now she's playing it
too
close,” Flint muttered nervously, seeing Old Snort's horn almost snag the alien.

Tsopi dodged aside, right at the brink of the pit. Old Snort tried to twist, and he was now going slowly enough so that his body did lurch over. But his front feet were on the vines, and under his weight they snapped like twigs and let him down. He plowed horns-first into the pit.

Vine logs flew up in a momentary splay. A foot-thick piece came down on Tsopi, knocking her into the pit.

“Oh, no!” Flint cried. Suddenly the peace of Spheres was imperiled. He sprinted toward the pit.

“Stay clear!” someone called. “There's no getting out of that hole!”

But Flint ran to the edge. The dinosaur seemed stunned; he was on his knees and not moving. The Polarian was wobbling crazily, but she was alive.

Old Snort shuddered. His head turned, and he struggled to rise from his knees. As he had half-slid over the edge, the dirt had been scraped into a pile at the bottom. That, and the cushioning effect of the vines, had spared the dinosaur from immediate harm. Still, a drop of ten feet was a considerable jolt for fifteen tons, and in other circumstances could have been fatal.

Now the Polarian was in trouble. She could not climb out, even where the edge was broken down, and her gyrations were attracting the notice of the dinosaur. The massive head swung about, the three horns orienting. Half stunned and stupid the monster might be, but in the confines of the pit he would soon smash Tsopi flat.

Flint slid down the broken wall, landing solidly but safely at the bottom. He drew his handax from its harness and rapped Old Snort's longest nose horn smartly. It clanged like a dry hollow vine. “Hi-ya, stupid!” he yelled.

The dinosaur lunged to his feet, snorting. He had been well named; the blast was deafening. But his little eye was fixed on Tsopi; he had not yet realized that there were now two creatures in the pit with him. The beast bucked his horns forward.

“Permit me!” Flint screamed over the ringing in his ears from the snort. He threw his arms about Tsopi's torso and heaved the alien into the air. The torso squeezed together like a bag of water. The horns rammed into the wall of the pit, immediately below the Polarian's hanging wheel.

Old Snort wrenched his head up. Dirt and sand sprayed, and another section of wall collapsed. Flint leaped aside, carrying the alien. The surface of Tsopi's torso was oddly slick, though dry, as though it had been polished. The large wheel spun slowly.

Flint brushed by the flaring shield of bone that guarded Old Snort's neck; it was taller than he was, and monstrous muscles were attached to it.

The dinosaur whipped his shield about, trying to smash the two tiny figures. This was one maneuver he was good at. Flint put out one foot. The edge of the shield caught. As it swung through, Flint walked right up over the saddle shape.

Old Snort bucked his head up and back, and the two were thrown off. They skidded down the corrugated back. They were now above the level of the ground, but there was no way to step across to it.

Flint half-slid, half-stepped down to the bottom of the pit beside the dinosaur's tail. He set Tsopi down. “Sorry if I squeezed you too tight.”

“I am better now,” the Polarian said. “I shall return the favor.” And she scooted forward.

Old Snort was just turning, unable to maneuver freely because his flanks kept banging into the walls of the pit. They were in danger of being crushed between the hulking body and the hard sand of the wall. Flint made a mental note: if he got out of this and if he ever had charge of a pit-construction crew, he would dig several man-sized holes in its base. Probably no man would ever again be caught in such a place with a live dinosaur, but...

Tsopi shot past the broad shield and around the blunt beak, making a keening noise. Even to Flint, that sound had an annoying quality. No doubt that was the intent.

The three horns snapped about, going after Tsopi with amazing accuracy. The Polarian squished aside and the horns missed—barely—and plowed into the wall again. More dirt tumbled down. Old Snort wrenched the horns up—apparently this was an automatic goring reflex, an excellent maneuver against a twenty foot tall carnosaur—and ripped out a larger section. What had taken the tribe weeks to excavate, this dinosaur was taking only moments to demolish.

But even as that awful armored nose cleared, Tsopi was wheeling back over the loose dirt, leaving cross-hatched treadmarks in the soft surface, taunting the dinosaur with that keening sound. For an instant the tentacle even touched one of the great horns, and the keening became momentary louder as the hollow horn amplified it. It was like spitting in the face of the monster.

Suddenly Flint realized what the alien was doing. She was making the dinosaur dig their way out of the hole. Every pass meant another gap in the wall, another mound of dirt in the bottom. Already there was a yard of it piled, and a six-foot section of wall had been demolished.

Of course Flint himself could have made it out of the pit, if Old Snort gave him time. He could jump and catch the edge of the pit and lift himself out, if the turf didn't crumble. But he couldn't carry the Polarian out, and the alien was too heavy to throw that far up.

Bit Flint, glad as he was to see a viable exit developing, foresaw one problem: when it leveled out enough to make a passable ramp for Solarian and Polarian, the dinosaur would also be able to climb out. They'd be back where they had started: with an enraged colossus charging about the plain.

No, not quite at the start. There had been time to remove the dead and wounded from the field, now. That much had been gained, at least.

Soon the job was done, for the animal was a powerful worker. Maybe someday man would learn to tame dinosaurs, and gain tremendous leverage against the environment. When a fair ramp was made, Tsopi led Old Snort into a half-turn, away from the gap. Then Flint ran around, put out an arm to assist Tsopi, and scrambled up the steep incline. For a moment dirt flew out under the alien's wheel, making a hole; Flint lifted, and they were over the brink and out.

But now, what of the dinosaur? Flint stood at the brink, uncertain. But old Snort did not follow them. He just kept turning, looking for the annoyance he had been chasing. He paid no attention to the ramp.

“Friend Plint, we must move!” Tsopi said urgently.

“In a moment,” Flint said. Something was nagging him, and he was unwilling to run before he figured it out.

Then Snort's eye came up almost level with Flint's own eye, the powerful neck muscles elevating the head surprisingly. What control the animal had! For a moment they stared at each other. The dinosaur's muscles bunched.

“Plint!”

Old Snort turned away.

He hadn't even recognized Flint as the quarry—because Flint was not in the pit.

In fact, the dinosaur was trapped. He
could
climb out, by gouging a wider passage to accommodate his huge body, then tramping up the ramp. But he
wouldn't
.

Because he was too dull to look that far ahead.

It suddenly hit Flint:
Stupidity was the greatest trap of all!
There was no confine worse than a slow brain. “May I never look my enemy in the eye and not know him,” Flint whispered to himself. “May I never miss the easy way because of slow wit.” There, truly, was the difference between man and dinosaur.

“No offense, Plint,” the Polarian said.

Flint was about to explain that he knew there was no present danger, but realized that this was not the question. “No offense,” he agreed. The alien had something of import to convey, perhaps controversial, and now was the time to say it.

“I am not familiar with your customs. Among my kind, when one entity preserves the life of another, there is a debt.”

“Among mine too,” Flint agreed warily. This pit experience had complicated his perception of the alien; Polarians did indeed have worthwhile qualities.

“You saved my life, at risk of your own.”

To avoid Spherical complications. But it would be indiscreet to say that. “And you saved mine.”

“We have exchanged debts,” the Polarian said.

“We have.” What was coming next?

“Farewell, debt brother,” Tsopi said.

That was all? “Farewell, debt sister,” Fleet echoed.

The Polarian departed, zooming across the ground at the incredible velocity of its kind. Flint watched, shaking his head. What a day!

Now the other tribesmen came close. “You did it!” one exclaimed. “You trapped Old Snort!”

“Topsy the Polarian did it,” Flint said. “She led the dinosaur into the trap, and helped me get out of it. The credit belongs to her, and to her alone. Tell Chief Strongspear.”

They looked dubious, bun one set off in the direction of the Chief. Flint knew that his statement, plus the evidence of the witnesses, would scotch any question of chiefly adoption. The only thing Chief Strongspear hated worse than an alien was an alien-lover.

Meanwhile, the hunters would be able to finish off old Snort at leisure, if need be by starving him to death. The tribe would feast royally for many days to come. There would be good leather for sandals, good sinew for tying bundles, and excellent bones for spears. The blood would make puddings and dinosaur-malt; the vertebrae would make clubs. The fat would make tallow for candles and grease for cooking. Almost every part of Old Snort would be used, eventually. Not because the tribesmen were unduly conservation-minded, but because it was easier to use what they had than to go out after another dinosaur one day sooner than necessary. Today's dead would be long remembered for their participation in this phenomenal hunt.

Yet it disturbed him, this slaughter. They could never have overcome Snort in his prime. The dinosaur was well over a century old, and generations of men had changed course in deference to this monster's stamping grounds. His demise was the end of an era, and this was sad.

There were other dinosaurs, of course, and some were larger and more vicious than Old Snort. Snort hadn't been a bad neighbor, really. He had left the tribe alone just as long as it had left him alone. Soon some other monster would move in to fill the vacuum, for this was prime grazing territory, and then the tribe might discover how well off it had been with Snort.