Future Weapons of War

“Phil! Guys!” the other yelled. “It’s an animal! It got Lisa!”

Two.

Cap shot away under the weeds, found a tree and raced aloft. He could barely see through the tangle of leaves, and was worried about their Goggles. He was hot now, and they had seen him. Did they know what he was?

They were distressed. He knew it from the increasing loudness, the shakes in the voices, the reek of fear from them and their indecision. He would win this yet. He didn’t know all of what he heard, but he knew the harness was recording it, and he caught some words he did know.

“—call for evac!” said one.

“We can’t!” said Sergeant. “The rebels know we are out here, that’s why we walked all this way. We are supposed to find those roving missile teams.”

“I know why we’re here, goddammit! But that thing killed Lisa and Misha!” one argued.

Sergeant replied, “You’re going to call in and abort because of an animal? Any idea how that will sound? And evac is for the wounded.”

“It’s still out there!”

“So now we know. We shoot it when it comes back, add it to the count,” Sergeant said.

“I don’t think—”

“I don’t care what you think!” Sergeant interrupted. “We’ll bivouac here, take a look in daylight if we can, and continue from there. Shoot anything that isn’t human. Var, you and Jaime take first watch.”

“S-sure, Phil,” “Uh-huh,” the two replied, not sounding happy. In a short while, the other four tucked cloaks around themselves and leaned against trees. Var and Jaime walked around the clearing, eyeing each other and the blackness. Cap dropped to the ground and crouched. He meant to kill Jaime if he could, then drag him off.

Jaime had the Comm.

It was halfway until dawn before the chance came. Cap didn’t sleep, simply watched and waited, though the day had been draining and disturbing. Patience was a tool of the hunter. The Enemies tossed restlessly before slipping into disturbed slumber. At the darkest, coolest time of night, Var muttered something to Jaime, then sat against a tree, took off his Goggles and rubbed his eyes. That made him almost blind. Cap moved without hesitation.

He leaped over a log, dropped into a slight dip, and exploded out of it. Here is where it was dangerous, if Var was looking. He wasn’t.

Jaime was just turning, not from suspicion, but from fear of the woods. Cap caught him on the back of the neck and bit, hard. A swiping pawful of claws tore his throat out and quieted him to a wet, breathy sound, and he dragged the body up the slope and into the dip.

A shout, a cough of a Gun, and a Bullet cracked past his ear, like a rotten bluemaple branch snapping. Cap knew what Bullets were, and flinched. He ran as fast as he could, hampered by the limp weight of his kill, and felt a sting in his tail. There were other shouts and shots, but none came close, and he ran until his legs and lungs were on fire. He crawled under a featherfern and pulled the corpse in with him, then opened his mouth wide to quiet his heaving breaths and listened for pursuit.

Three.

The Enemy was shouting now, scared. They hadn’t followed him because they were consumed with their own fear, their fear of him. Cap knew what pleasure was, and that was pleasure. He took a look at his tail, and found some short length had been shot away by the stray Bullet.

It stung badly, and throbbed. He would accept it. He had the Comm, and had done what his friends wanted.

“Jaime has the rebel comm!” one Enemy shouted.

“You make it sound like it chose him on purpose. We’ll find it during the day. We have a sensorpack,” Sergeant replied.

“I tell you that cat thing is hunting us, and knows exactly what it’s doing!” was the response.

“And I tell you it’s a dumb animal. It’s been hit, look. Here’s a blood trail. Grab your gear and we’ll follow it.”

“Are you insane?”

The voices became confused. Cap didn’t understand the words, but the fear was clear. They would look for him, but not yet. Not until it was light. Very well. He could hunt in light, too. Rising, he dragged the body further away. They might follow this trail, and he had to confuse it.

The creek was refreshing and cool, and he followed it upstream for some distance, splashing softly in the rippling pebbled shallows. He dragged his burden up a rocky shelf, back into the woods, and found a good spot, near some firethorns. No one went near firethorns. They would spring and sting their prey with a painful bite. He checked again to make sure the Comm was still in Jaime’s harness. It was. The fabric was too tough for him to tear, but he yanked at the straps with his fangs until he was able to wiggle it out. He paused, turned to the body and ate noisily and quickly, until he knew to stop. If he filled up, he would be unable to hunt. He tore out a final warm, quivering mouthful of flesh, shredded it with his teeth and tongue, and swallowed. Salty and rich, and he savored it. The taste of his Enemy’s death. The rest of the body went into the firethorn bed, where it could fertilize them, and the Comm went several hundred paces away with him. He bit hard, until the case and a tooth cracked, then bashed it against a rock until it was open. It had to be destroyed, and he wasn’t sure how good the Enemy’s tools were at finding it. He urinated in the open case, and buried it as deep as he could in a damp depression that was overgrown with weeds.

He was done. The Comm was safe, and he could rest, then transmit his last Datadump and work his weary way back to Home. Hunger and fatigue gnawed at him to do that very thing, but another part was still awake. That part was sad, angry, and mean. It meant to avenge David’s death, and it did not want to be ignored. And there were only five of them left. Rest could wait. The Datadump could wait if need be. Some Duties were more pressing than others.

* * * *

Dawn was breaking, and Cap was near the Enemy again. They looked ragged, drained, and fearful. He would help them feel that even more. They’d found no sign of either him or the Comm with their tools, and that meant Cap had done well. He felt pleasure, and a hint of satisfaction. They had killed David and taken the Comm, but he had killed three of them already and destroyed it. But it would not bring David back. He whimpered in loneliness.

They were trudging back the way they’d come, and he followed them behind and above, slinking from limb to limb on the overhead path they had yet to suspect. He detoured where the trees thinned, but kept the Enemy always in sight. It was an old game that he knew from instinct and training. When Leopards had been taken from their Old Home to this New Home, they brought their skills with them. The Ripper of the forest might be stronger and faster, but Leopards were better trackers. And Cap, or Capstick, as David had called him since he was paired, was one of the best Leopards in the Military.

Below, Sergeant said, “Look, it’s daylight, we should be fine. We’ll set mines there,” he pointed, “and there. You watch, Cynd, and wake us in two hours. We’ll move again, then rest again, okay?”

“I think so,” the female Cynd said. Cap watched as the Squad shuffled about the area. They were placing the small boxes he recognized as explosives. He’d seen those in training. They were smaller and different shaped than his people’s, but he knew what they were. He paid rapt attention to the placement.

Then the Squad lay down to sleep again, leaving her to stand watch. But she did stand, not sit, and he wasn’t sure of his chances.

He watched as she moved around, alert and careful. There was a smell of not quite fear.

Eagerness. Worry, that was it. Cap knew how to do this. First, he must move away and out of sight.

Slipping through the growth, padding slowly and cautiously so as not to rustle, he edged around their clearing. There was one box, at the base of a tree, standing on its legs. It took only a moment to bite it gingerly between fangs and turn it the other way. And it was so thoughtful of them to paint the back side yellow.

Another patient turn brought him to two more. The last of the three was stuck in a tree on a spike. It took some figuring on what to do, as it was wedged in tightly. But it shifted a little when he gripped it, and he was able to rotate it around its mount.

After that, it was no trick to get back in the trees, on the high branches. They would take his weight, and