Copyright 2015 Paul G Mann
One
He stood rock still barely taking a breath. His arm was beginning to ache as the pressure of keeping the bow string drawn back to his chin began to cramp his biceps, but he knew, one false move, one sound out of the ordinary could be his last if the Ripper he was stalking caught his scent, heard him or saw him. He had the beast dead to rights, all he lacked was a clear sure shot through the trees, and while he was a patient man when out hunting, he had a gnawing feeling that the Rippers mate, now out of his vision, could be circling looking for an opportunity to spring and rip him to shreds.
Rippers were nasty beasts; half the size again of a wolf hound and twice as heavy they resembled a dog only in the way they looked and ran. Four legs with wicked claws that unlike a dog were retractable like a cat. A long snout with teeth more in keeping with an Earth shark and fast, faster than anything he had ever seen or heard about back home on Earth. They were the scourge of Newth roaming the forests and grasslands killing anything they thought of as a meal. Like the shark they had a bloodlust that once aroused couldn’t be sated or satisfied until whatever they attacked had been killed and eaten. Even when sated only the foolhardy would go anywhere near one without fear of being ripped apart.
At last the Ripper moved and instinctively his fingers relaxed releasing the bow string. The yard long arrow sped true from the powerful bow taking the animal in the neck severing windpipe and jugular that stopped a full throated scream from the beast. With nothing more than a gurgle of blood it fell to the forest floor where it had stood. To his left he heard the unmistakeable snarl of an adult Ripper quickly followed by the sound of trampled shrubbery as the beast charged him through the undergrowth. Panic and fear was useless, he was too experienced a hunter to let those two killer emotions invade his mind. The bow was of no further use. The speed of the charging beast meant it would be on him before he could have an arrow knocked and the bow turned in the direction of the attacking animal; to then take aim and fire with any chance of reasonable success was a pipe dream.
He pulled his knife; an old brittle stone knife some eight inches in length, made from a Ripper claw; sharp and deadly it would only give him one decent hack at the beast before it would break. At the same time, his other hand pulled an arrow from the quiver and in one fluid movement he turned in the direction of the charging Ripper. It was less than a dozen yards from him, back legs already digging claws into the ground ready to spring at him with teeth and front claws looking to tear the flesh from his bones. He crouched and dived, rolling as he did so towards and underneath the animal pushing the arrow upwards with all his strength as he came out of the roll on to his back and quickly onto his feet turning in a crouch to face the enraged beast. He knew instinctively by the scream the creature made and the way in which the arrow was snatched from his grip that he had drawn blood and wounded it.
Wounded it may be but Rippers were quick and anything short of a killing blow would not deter it from trying to rip him to shreds. He knew these animals well, hunting and tracking them was his business, a business very few if any others on this God forsaken planet followed. His movements in tackling the beast was one of a well trained athlete; knife in hand he crouched, his leg muscles fine tuned coils of power ready to spring away from the Ripper as it turned to attack him once more. Irate it hadn’t killed its quarry on the first pass it sprang once again with an increased viciousness, the arrow in its underside ignored as the bloodlust desire to rip flesh from bone drove it to bury its teeth into its prey.
Cool and calm the hunter waited, muscles tightly coiled waiting for the right moment to thrust the knife into the animals throat. He watched as it sprang; this was the most dangerous time of the hunt, he could avoid the animals fangs with ease, what he trusted to luck and God was his ability to avoid the wicked hooked, barbed and razor sharp claws that the slightest of touches would slice his flesh to the bone. The knives these claws made would let him trade for enough goods and provisions to see him through the winter. He feigned to roll under the animal once more; at the last second he let the roll take him to his left bringing the knife upwards from waist height as he did so and buried it in the animals’ neck under the jaw, the blade penetrated the throat, up through the roof of the mouth and into the brain; the momentum and weight of the attack breaking the knife at the hilt.
He felt the blade break and knew that his last chance to kill the Ripper without serious injury to himself had gone. The next few seconds would tell if his last blow had done its job and whether he lived or died today. He sprang to his feet, covered in hot stinking Ripper blood, a cursory once over look at the Ripper told him it was dead and he let out his long pent up breath. Another cursory look at himself showed no serious injury although it revealed how lucky he had been with nothing more than a few deep cuts across his chest where the Rippers’ claws had caught a glancing blow, those and a small cut on his upper arm would need a stitch or two; his other minor injuries needed nothing more than a good cleaning and all would be well.
It had been a good mornings work, two Rippers with their coats and claws was a good return for the weeks effort he had put in tracking and stalking the animals. He set to with a will, skinning the animals and roughly scrapping the fat off the hides. He cut the four claws away from each pad, wicked things, the smallest six inches in length, the biggest nearly nine. The claws once shaped and honed would make nice knives, the biggest he would keep for himself the others he would trade in Haroldstown market. The pelts however he would unload on to anyone who lived alone away from the hovels of the towns and villages. They would bring him a dry bed for a few nights with some home cooked food if he was lucky. The people out here in the woods would be glad of them as Rippers steered clear of their own smell; the only thing a Ripper feared was another of its kind and a Ripper pelt hanging over a cave entrance was a good deterrent.
With the animals skinned and declawed he left the meat to rot on the woodland floor; the only thing Ripper meat was good for was to feed the birds. Tough and stringy with a bitter taste and a smell of rotten eggs that a really starving man would hesitate to eat, it was best left where it was for the woodland scavengers, he would come back in a few weeks for the bones once they had been picked clean; these too would make strong knives, arrow heads and axe heads from the thigh and hip bones. The rest of the skeleton would make any number of other useful tools and implements that would be traded next spring for goods and provisions.
Most people on Newth congregated in tunnels underground; mainly for defence against the Hunki, not that they gave any defence. These places stank to high heaven and Fred hated them as much as he hated the Hunki. He was also a giant of a man standing over six foot six in height weighing some twenty stone. There wasn’t an ounce of fat on him; his massive bulk was all hard lean muscle that a hundred years living alone in the forest and woodlands hunting Rippers had honed into a fit athletic man with highly trained senses that made him stand out from other humans. His size had been distinctive back on Earth where the average height for a man was less than five foot six and that distinction had followed him here. He had learned over a hundred years ago that the tunnels were no place for him; his very bulk made living in them near impossible, coupled with the smell and filth they were too confined for him, he needed the fresh open spaces to be able to breathe in peace.
In reality he was over a hundred and thirty years old; nothing out of the ordinary here on Newth. For some reason everyone had life spans or could live if they escaped the Hunki and the Rippers for many hundreds of years. Fred had met more than one resident of this world over two hundred years of age and looking as if they were only in their early thirties. Nice long lives without illness that had a downside, no children existed on Newth, no one was born here and the Hunki
never brought any to live here. You only died here if you committed suicide like so many did, were killed by the Rippers, hunted by the Hunki or were unfortunate enough to ne murdered or have an accident. It was a mystery of life on this planet that no one had an answer to.
Another reason he liked the open spaces of woods and forest was because the Hunki didn’t; their weapons in woodland were awkward and their physique made stealth something they could never achieve. Short and squat with a waddle rather than a walk, creeping about in woodland was something a Hunki could never do. Forget the tunnels he often thought, the woods were far safer even with