The Mammoth Book of Apocalyptic SF - Mike Ashley [226]
"Nothing I expected." Tanya stood frowning after them. "No large land animal could have survived. Perhaps a few sea creatures did. The whales were prehistoric land dwellers that migrated into the sea. Maybe they've returned as amphibians."
The alarmed hoppers settled down. Tanya had us stand still in the shadow of the plane as they grazed in toward us, till Pepe shouted again.
"If you want a killer, here it comes!"
The hopper leader stood tall again, with a kind of purring scream. The grazers reared and scattered in panic.
Something swift and tiger-striped pounced out of the grass and darted to overtake a baby before it could leap again. Arne's rifle crashed, and the two tumbled down together.
"I told you," Tanya scolded him. "Don't do that."
"Specimens." He shrugged. "You ought to take a look."
He stayed on guard with the gun while I went on with her to study his kills. No larger than a dog, the infant hopper was hairless, covered with fine grey scales, its belly torn open and entrails exposed. Tanya spread the mangled body on the grass for my camera.
"It's well shaped for its apparent ecological niche, but that's about all I can say." She shook her head in frustration. "We must have had a hundred million years of change."
The killer was a compact mass of powerful muscle, clad in sleek black fur. She opened its bloody jaws to show the fangs to my camera, had me move the body to show the teats and claws.
"A mammal." She spoke for the microphone. "Descended perhaps from rats or mice that somehow got through alive."
Still aglow with the elation of discovery, she forgave Arne for his kill.
"A new world for a new race!" she exulted.
"Maybe," Arne muttered. "But ours? More likely a brand new biology, where we'll never belong."
"We'll see." She shrugged and looked around again at the sea where the great amphibians lived and the jungle that had bred the killer. "We're here to see."
She set the robot to scraping soil from the top of a rocky knob to level a site for our lab and living quarters. We unloaded supplies and set up the first geodesic dome. The robot began cutting stone for a defensive wall. She took me on short expeditions along the shore and up the ridge to record the flora and fauna we found. She was soon asking Pepe about fuel for the plane.
"The reserve still aboard might get us back to the Moon, with half a drop left in the tanks."
"With only one aboard?"
"Safe enough."
Then I want you to go back for what we need to replant our own biocosm. Seed, frozen eggs and embryos, equipment for the lab."
"To replant ourselves?" Arne scowled at her. "With that black biocosm just over the ridge?"
She shrugged. "We face risks. We must cope when we can. Leave our records when we can't." She turned to me. "You'll go back with Pepe. Holograph the data we can send you. Hold the fort."
"And leave us marooned?" Arne went pale. "Just the two of us?"
"Pepe will be back," she told him. "You have enough to do here. Testing soils. Prospecting for oil and ores we'll need."
Pepe and I went back to the Moon. My beagle was happy to have me home. The robots loaded and refueled the plane. Pepe took off and left me alone and very lonely. The robots were poor companions and the holos had nothing new to say, but Spaceman was a comfort until I got news from Earth.
Pepe had inflated another geodome for a hydroponic garden. Arne surveyed land for a farm. When the rainy season ended, the robotic Calvin built a diversion dam to draw irrigation water from the river.
"Arne enjoys shooting a yearling jumper when we need meat," Tanya reported. "A tasty change from the irradiated stuff we brought from the Moon. The hippo-whales come and go between the river and the grass. They stopped twice to stare and bellow, but they ignore us now. I think our tiny human island really is secure, though Arne still frets about the black spot. He's gone now to climb the western cliffs for a look beyond the rim."
Her next transmission came only hours later.
"Arne's back." Her voice was tight and quick. "Exhausted and in panic. Something