Jerry Oltion - Anywhere but Here

He picked the body up by a clawed foot and carried it back to the pickup. Donna was turning slowly around, like a radar dish, her eyes never leaving the sky.

“You’re going to make yourself dizzy doing that,” he said.

“Better dizzy than dead.”

“Have a look at this,” he said, laying the bird at her feet. “I’ll keep watch.”

While she examined their would-be killer, he pulled one of the arrows out of the ground. It was much harder to free than he expected, and when he looked at the tip he saw why: it was barbed. The whole shaft was that way. It was probably just the leftover flanges from needles that had sloughed off as the branch grew, but it made an effective arrow. Most likely an effective seed, too. Trent bet that the barbs at the tip would develop into roots if he’d left the arrow in the ground. And the pointed end would probably grow into a taproot, though there might not be any need for it, as sharp as it was. This one had buried itself six inches deep, anyway.

He looked into the sky. No more birds. Plenty of arrows, though. Fifty or sixty per tree, at least.

“Which came first,” he said, “the arrow or the archer?”

“Hmm?” Donna was stretching out one of the bird’s wings. It had about a three-foot span just on that one side. Up close, its scales made a soft rustling sound.

“I’d bet anything these arrows are how the trees reproduce,” Trent said. “Because they make good arrows, birds carry them farther than seeds would go on their own, and if they don’t hit a target, they plant themselves instantly, ready to grow.”

“Could be,” Donna said. “They certainly work as arrows, anyway.” She looked up, then around at the hillside, then back at the bird. “I think its just a bird,” she said at last. “There’s nothing artificial here, no clothing or paint or jewelry or anything like that. And with hunting weapons growing wild, they wouldn’t have to develop intelligence.”

“How do you figure that?” Trent hefted the arrow like a spear, then gave it a high lob downhill. It arched over beautifully, perfectly balanced, and stuck when it hit.

She shrugged. “Just a theory, but I was thinking that if you hand a species everything they need, there’s no incentive to work for it.”

Trent snorted. “Seems to be that way in humans, anyway.” He looked for his beer, found it in the dirt where he’d picked up the rock to chock the tires with, and took a long swig. “Weird to think that evolution could keep something from developing intelligence, but I can see how it might.” He scanned the sky again. “I imagine we’ll find out for sure soon enough, but in the meantime, we’re going to need some protection.”

He tried to think what might work. A hardhat would be a good start, but they hadn’t brought any, and a hardhat wouldn’t protect the shoulders or chest or back anyway. They needed chain mail, or maybe even full plate armor, if they planned to spend much time outdoors.

Or they needed to get out of the woods. Those arrows were fairly heavy; he was willing to bet a bird this size couldn’t carry one more than a mile or so. He looked out into the flatland beyond the mountains. It might be possible to drive that far. The pickup could probably make it down the slope they were on with just three tires, and the regenerative brakes in the wheel motors would generate power on the way, which would give them a little extra battery juice to make a few miles on flat ground. They would need the fourth tire once they got there, but he was willing to bet they would find it down at the bottom of the slope.

He looked upward. Still no birds. Even so, the back of his neck itched with anxiety. What else would turn out to be dangerous around here? The mountainside had taken on a more sinister cast in the last few minutes.

He loosened the rifle’s strap and slung it over his shoulder, then went into the camper and got the holster for the pistol. “Here you go,” he said, handing it to Donna. “Until we’re sure what’s safe and what’s not, we should both stay armed.”

She didn’t protest. Trent kept an eye out while she belted the holster around her waist and slid the pistol into it.

When he had first looked out of the camper after their landing, he had thought they had come to rest in a pretty good pile of rocks, but now that he had a minute, he could see that they were actually pretty lucky. There were plenty of rocks around, but the pickup seemed to be sitting in the middle of a clear spot maybe thirty feet across. It looked almost as if they had been blasted away by the impact of the pickups landing, except that the real impact zone was uphill a ways.

One of the rocks shifted a little. Settling, apparently, from being dislodged in the crash, except it was at least ten feet away from the pickup. Why would it have been dislodged way over there?

Another rock shifted. Trent heard a soft click just behind him and whirled around, unslinging his rifle in the same motion, but he saw nothing that might have made the noise. The rock he’d tripped over during the arrow attack was the only thing even close.

But hadn’t it been right in front of the camper door? Now it was a couple feet beyond it. He couldn’t have kicked it that far when he’d fallen or he’d have landed on it.

“What’s the matter?” Donna asked.

“I’m not sure,” he said, unwilling to voice his suspicion without more evidence.

He kept his eye on the rock, glancing up into the sky every few seconds to watch for more birds, too. He nearly missed it when the motion came, but he caught it out of the corner of his eye: the rock lifted up about an inch and fell forward with a soft thump .

“Son of a bitch,” Trent whispered. “They’re alive.”

“What are?” Donna hadn’t seen it.

“The rocks. Watch.” He pointed at the one in front of him.

“The rocks ?” Her tone of voice made it clear how little she believed that.

“Just watch.” Trent waited, not quite aiming his rifle at the rock. He heard a soft thump off to the side, and then another quite a ways behind him, but he didn’t take his eyes off the one in front of him, except to glance overhead and make sure there weren’t any more birds with arrows up there. Now that he was listening for them, he heard a steady patter of little thumps from all around.

After maybe twenty seconds, the rock he and Donna were watching lifted up and scooted forward again.

“My god, you’re right!” Donna said. “They are alive.”

Trent looked out at the others, most of them at least ten feet from the pickup and receding an inch at a time, and he couldn’t help laughing. “Not only that, but they’re running like hell. We probably scared the shit out of them when we crashed down here in the middle of ’em.”

He pulled loose the second arrow that the bird had tried to spear him with, stuck the tip under the edge of the rock at his feet, and flipped it over, but it rolled right on around and flopped back onto its flat bottom. Now Trent knew why they were round on top, but he wanted to see how they moved. He flipped it over again, this time slopping it with the arrow before it could roll all the way. The underside was smooth and bony, like the underside of a turtle, with three little ovals spaced evenly around it about an inch in from the rim. As he watched, the ovals flipped up in front and down in back, pivoted through a 180-degree turn, and closed up smooth with the rest of the shell again. The rock did that a couple more times, then it started wobbling from side to side. Trent let it go, and the wobble intensified until the rock rolled back upright.

He felt a little wobbly himself. He had picked up two of them and carried them around without even knowing they were alive. If they’d been snapping turtles, they could have bitten his nuts off.