The Leagacy of Heorot

The fields beyond the outer fence were a shambles, torn by knots of struggling monsters, the very earth grooved by their speed-augmented frenzy. They've plowed it for our next planting. Cadma

"Something?" Stu's voice spoke from his collar.

"No. Forgot the mike was on. Random thought."

More explosions in the mine fields. We'll be ru

Too many grendels. "How the fuck can they grow so fast?" Cadma

"You want the long answer or the short one?" Greg asked.

"Neither. I've heard both."

"Cadma

Cadma

"I've got to take off!"

"What?"

"I hear them! They're out there, in the lake—"

Who was that? Marty hadn't been hit by Hibernation Instability, had he? But how could you really tell? "Of course they're out in the lake, Marty. They're samlon—"

"No, no, I mean right here, I hear them pounding on the hull! Cadma

Cadma

"We have to have the Minervas! What happens to the people up in Geographic? I've got to get out of here!"

"Stay tight," Cadma

The Skeeter reached the area between the fences. Cadma

The Skeeter whirled past in tight circles. Two men and a woman leaned out of the doorway to dump kerosene. The rotor blades scattered the oily liquid. The stench merged with burning flesh and the heavy Avalon mist.

"Three more cans and we're done," Stu reported.

"Right."

The Skeeter was forty feet off the ground. A grendel standing atop the piled corpses at the fence break leaped upward. The tower light caught it in mid flight. Its upward arc stopped just short of the Skeeter. Then a smaller dark object followed it down.

"Jesus!" Cadma

"I know. Ida saw it. She says it damn near got its jaws on the skid! Cad, they're not even grown yet!"

"How's the kerosene?"

"She dropped the can on top of that one. We're done."

"Get upwind." Cadma

"Cadma

"Marty, for God's sake!" Cadma

Skeeter One's power. We have to recharge, and we have to have the fences, and I have to think! Shut up and sit tight, damn it!"

"I hear them. They're coming up the tailpipe!"

"There's nothing there to eat. Marty, I don't have time for this.

Out."

Cadma

Flames leaped upward.

"What about the Minerva?" Greg asked. "Isn't he right? The longer you wait, the better the chance a grendel will crawl up the tailpipes. What will that do to the ramjet?"

"I don't know."

"You don't know? Damn all—"

"I know this," Cadma

Greg stared at him for a moment, then went back to the searchlight.

A thick pall of smoky death smells lay over the Colony. A few small fires still burned in the area between fences, but mostly it was dark there. The tower searchlight played through the area.

Cadma

"If there's anything alive in there I can't see it," Greg said.

"Cadma

"I think so. We want dead grendels here. Lots of dead grendels. The more we kill here—"

"Yeah." Greg's new wife was pregnant and up in Geographic. "Yeah, I can see that. Too bad I have to stay and run the searchlight—"

"I can do that." Jill's head appeared at the platform level. She climbed carefully, using her right arm. The left was bound in gauze and immobilized.

"You ought to be—"

"I ought to be in the Mayo Clinic," she said. "But that's not here. It hurts too much to sleep, and—and I don't want to be near fires. I can run the spotlight."

"Okay. Greg—"

"I didn't hear myself volunteer." He looked at Jill's arm, then led the way down the ladder.

Jill's voice followed them. "Don't take chances."

It wasn't fu

The house had been Mary A

"All right. Nobody gets killed," Cadma

"If they do not, we will reason with them," Carlos said. He held a spear gun poised and ready.

"Let's go, then." Cadma

The others came through gingerly. Cadma

Ten meters out was half a grendel. Entrails had been pulled out of it to stretch along for another two meters.

It tried to move. Attached by bloody cords, the tail thrummed. Cadma

"Damn. They die hard," Phyllis McAndrews said.

"That they do," Cadma

There was little sound. In the distance, a grendel's scream ran the scale and clipped off. Out beyond the external fence grendels clustered in shadow, feasted. There was a slow, constant motion of grendels dragging meat toward the river.

"Here's the tricky part," Cadma

"They do not like fire," Carlos said.

"That they don't. Gives us a chance." Cadma

"Cadma

It exploded into snarling jaws. Carlos was getting good at that.

"Jesus," someone shouted.

"Skeeter One. We'll need a little fire support," Cadma

"Coming now." The Skeeter flashed overhead. Its lights played out beyond the fence perimeter.