Primitive Instinct: The Journey Home

We went back into the woods and went much farther than before. When we stopped and Roar’kaol’tok started searching around the snow for tracks, I let Diesel off the leads and pulled them over my shoulders so he could track with me, since I couldn’t see as well as the hunter could, thanks to his owl-like eyes or smell half as good as Diesel. So much for being the superior species. Out here, I was the bottom of the barrel.

We walked for a long time, stopping only when one of us, meaning not me or Diesel, got lucky and shot another baan’tu or skaal. Diesel grumbled a bit and sneezed before rubbing his leg over his snout. He did that a few times before the smell hit me and I almost gagged.

It was a rotten, earthy scent, like how a lake reeked during a bad drought or when a flooded river receded back to normal levels. It was almost like organic compost, and it was disgusting. The worst part was that it was a thick stink, so it stuck in nose, all the way down to your mouth and seared the foulness into your airways and lungs. There was no way you wouldn’t be smelling yuck for a long time after getting away from it. Texas was home to some massive wild hogs and those things smelled like death. It’s an unmistakable scent that you’ll never forget. While this one wasn’t quite as... carrion smelling, I was still having a hard time deciding which one was worse.

Roar’kaol’tok sniffed and nodded, notching another arrow before he lowered himself slightly, walking in a half crouch towards the source of the stink.

Because that’s not a murder pig we’re smelling. No concerns at all there, big guy, I thought to myself as I dropped the leads and pulled my bow from over my shoulder and notched an arrow before Diesel and I crept along behind the hunter.

Safest place to be is behind the guy that knew the things and stuff, right?

He stopped and motioned for me to come up to his side and I should have guessed by now that what I was going to see wasn’t what I was expecting to find, but it still kind of shocked me to find these creatures that had the same size and build as a capybara, but with much thicker fur, and two teeny little tusks on their bottom jaw that, judging from the scraped up tree trunks around us, I would say they were used to peel bark.

Roar’kaol’tok pointed to what I could only call a nest, but it was on the ground. After a brief inspection, I figured it was the source of the stink because it looked like a big pile of random sticks and branches held together by mud.

I wrinkled my nose and the hunter smiled before holding up three fingers and pointed to the creatures then moving away silently. I looked skyward before motioning for Diesel to come with me as we went to find a good place to try and shoot these nasty little pig-rat things. Hopefully, I’d actually get to shoot something, because I was feeling pretty freaking useless right about now.

I drew back my bowstring and took aim, adjusting for the heavy flint tip and the fact it would travel slow as molasses, picking an adult that was snuffling around in the snow not very far from where Diesel and I were hiding behind a tree.

I listened for the soft twang of Roar’kaol’tok’s bow and instantly released mine and notching another arrow as pandemonium broke out below us.

“Diesel! Choke!” I pointed to the pig rat that I had only managed to injure and sent my lovable floof off to go kill something.

In our adventures to keep his mind stimulated, we had taken a course on defense, and I expanded on it a bit by teaching Diesel to grab the throat of whatever I pointed out and put enough pressure on it to render it unconscious. If someone wants to attack me, I’m not just going to let them run off to find another victim when they get a look at my best boy. I didn’t want them dead, but I was sure as shit going to make sure they got the ass whooping they deserved, even if it came from a dog.

It didn’t matter, though, because before Diesel could even get halfway to the thing, it dropped, one of Roar’kaol’tok’s arrows sticking out of its throat where it destroyed both jugular veins, making it bleed out before it even stopped sliding in the snow.

“Dammit,” I hissed as I released the tension on my bowstring when the last of the creatures darted off into the woods. Diesel whined and I pet his head. “It’s not your fault, boy. It’s just been a while since I used a bow and never one with flint arrowheads. I’ll adjust and get it next time. Come on. Let’s go get the sled.”

When we came back to the nest, Roar’kaol’tok was cleaning his arrows off in the snow then pointed to the one I had injured and waving me closer.

“Pulak,” he said then grabbed my hand, using my finger to feel where I had shot my arrow. I felt a bone and he poked at my shoulder blade. “Kaa good, Fern’mak’tak.”

“Yeah, I know it was a bad shot,” I sighed and pulled my arrow out, but stared at a bloody shaft with only a small chip of flint left. “Well, that’s great.”

He chuckled and patted his paw on my shoulder before bending and gutting the pulak before putting it on the sled. When we had all four of them loaded along with the handful of smaller baan’tu and skaal, I called Diesel and put the leads onto his harness.

A lot can be said about Diesel’s attitude. He’s a bit prickly at times and he’s not at all the affectionate cuddler most other dogs are. But there’s no such thing as ‘quit’ for him. When he’s decided to do something, he does it with all he’s got. That was what he did to pull the very heavy sled.

I hopped over the lead and stood behind him, grabbing the front of the sled with my arms behind me and pulling with him to save him the energy.

“Kaa,” Roar’kaol’tok shook his head and moved to take one of the carcasses off and Diesel growled before throwing more of himself into the job of pulling.

“Don’t hurt yourself, Dies,” I told him, pulling harder with him. If my best friend needed a bit of extra muscle to do something he’s always wanted to do, at least I had thumbs to offer for the job.

We moved kind of slow on our way back to the village and Roar’kaol’tok had moved a fair distance ahead of us to maybe find some more skaal or baan’tu during the return trip. I’d say it was maybe two hours since we left the nest when I felt like I was doing more pulling than Diesel was and I looked away from the base of his tail where I’d been staring blankly as I focused on the job at hand and saw his hackles raised slightly while his ears twisted around, trying to find a sound, but not being able to pin it down.

I frowned and looked around just as his head snapped slightly ahead and to our left where this wolf-like snow leopard thing was sprinting silently at full speed towards Roar’kaol’tok, who had his back to the creature and had no idea he was probably about to die.

I gasped and ripped the toggles free from the loops and pointed, sending Diesel off like a bullet towards the slightly smaller predator.

“Roar!” I yelled, getting him to spin around just as the two animals collided and rolled in the snow.

Vicious growling and snarling and the sound of teeth snapping at air filled the woods as I ran towards my only family while Roar’kaol’tok held his bow ready but unable to take a shot in fear that he hit Diesel as the two animals fought like savages. He’d circled around them some, looking for an opening and not finding one so he stood between me and the battle as I got closer, blocking my view of what was going on.

A shrill, painful yelp echoed out and sent a stab of cold, deadly fear into my heart.

“Diesel!” I screamed, snatching the bone knife from the hunter’s belt loops and diving onto the back of the snow wolf, wrapped an arm under its neck, and slammed the knife into its chest twice before twisting it and the beast collapsed, dead. “Diesel!”

I scrambled over to my dog, who was laying on his side, and ripped my gloves off.

“Diesel! Diesel, you better be o-fucking-kay! You can’t be hurt, you hear me?!” I cried as I quickly took stock of his injuries.

He had some bloody bites and claw marks, but nothing that was very serious before checking his legs to make sure they weren’t broken and then his back. Finding him with only minor damage, I laid my head on his side and sobbed in relief before wrapping my arms around his neck and squeezing in a hug he didn’t complain about even a little bit for a change.

“Fern,” the hunter said gently, and I felt a paw on my back.

I wiped my face and sniffed before looking at him as he sank to his knees beside us and my lip wobbled again, thinking about how I could have lost my best and only friend and the only living being in the whole world that would notice or even care if something happened to me.

“I almost lost him,” I sobbed again, and Diesel groaned before sitting up slowly to lick at my face with a soft whine.

When I managed to get my shit back together again, I wiped the wetness from my face and sniffed a few times before Roar’kaol’tok held out my gloves and rubbed at Diesel’s head.

“Orou,” he said looking at the dead predator then rubbed gently at a spot on Diesel’s head that made him whimper softly. He pointed to my head, then his own before bringing his fists together and pointing at the sore spot on Diesel’s head.

“Headbutt,” I looked at Diesel and he swished his tail on the ground behind him.

Then Roar’kaol’tok did something incredibly comical and faked being dizzy before falling backwards, making Diesel grumble before standing and moving over just a bit and sitting down, right on the hunter’s chest. I sniffed and laughed when the hunter pushed him off and grinned before getting up and dusting the snow off of himself and going to get the sled.

“Headbutting is for the desperate. You had that thing on the ropes, huh?” I asked him and he grinned, slightly bloody teeth on full display. “Good boy, Dies. The best boy.”

I rubbed his chest between his front legs, knowing he had several bloody bites on his neck, and he put his paw on my hand, pushing it away with a huff.

“Mom, you’ll embarrass me in front of the cool kids,” I mimicked a kid before booping his nose. “I love you, Diesel Mack. I don’t know what I’d do if I lost you.”

He licked my face again as the hunter came over with the sled.

“Fern kaa mak’tak,” he said and pulled his knife out of the chest of the orou and cleaned it in the snow. “Diesel kaa mak’tak.”

“I’m done with excitement today,” I sighed and got up when he added the carcass to the pile on the sled.

The hunter refused to let Diesel pull the sled anymore and I refused to let him drag it by himself, so I pushed from the back as Diesel held his head high the whole way back to the village. I stared at the snow wolf thinking about why it went after Roar’kaol’tok when Diesel and I were the easier prey.

I thought back through all of the survival tips and information my uncle had taught me, and it took a while because it was a lot of information. Predators, especially solitary hunters, hunted the weaker targets from a group. By all measure, that should have been me and Diesel, since we were moving slowly and probably smelled like blood, so it had to have taken that as an injury.

Instead, it went for the huge and healthy hunter with weapons literally in his paws. It didn’t make sense. It wasn’t until we got close enough to smell the smoke from the fires at the village that it finally came to me.

“When threatened by more than one interloper, a solitary predator will target the bigger threat before moving on to the lesser,” I said, repeating the words Rudy had told me after watching a documentary where a pack of coyotes had cornered a bobcat. “The bigger threat wasn’t us, Dies. It was him. And he didn’t know it was coming until I called out to him. What the hell kind of fucked up experiments are these crackpots running here?”