Koban: The Mark of Koban Read Online Free Page A

yet unable to
provide their own food. They didn’t seem to grasp the irony of the situation.
Without the modified and boosted humans to help them, they could not survive
here very long.
    The coffee finally gone, both men, in tacit uncoordinated
agreement, broke down their heavy rifles to ensure they were clean and in
perfect operating condition. It didn’t matter that the yak bulls couldn’t reach
them up there on the rocks. It was a survival habit recognizing that nearly
every example of animal life on Koban was potentially dangerous to humans.
Often they were deliberately and aggressively so.
    Even genetically enhanced humans were at a severe
disadvantage on Koban without technology to protect them, such as the shuttles,
heavy and light weapons, electrified fences, communications, and their intelligence.
People died several times a month from carelessly forgetting where they were
and what to look for, even with guns and someone to cover their back.
    Thad used his scope to sight-in the lead yaks and measure
distance, noting as usual that it was large bulls breaking the way through the
shallow snow. They were too far out, almost a mile yet, for accurate shots in
this wind and light snow, on a gray day. There were perhaps a hundred animals
in this particular herd. If given the choice, they would take only the whiter
haired young females, as having the more tender cuts of meat. The larger bulls had
more meat but were tougher. The bulls usually were discernible by the darker
remnants of bluer stringy hair under their necks, as well as their size. They
all had wide curved horns, and a cross-the-skull bony ridge.
    He told Dillon, who was checking his own sights and scope
computer, “We can probably go up and take our shots in about ten minutes,
though they could be headed for the bushes at the base of our hill. There are
still leaves on those, and the grass under the snow around the base on the
backside felt thicker when we started our climb up here. If so we can have our
pick of the herd if they walk right up to us to graze.”
    Dillon lowered his rifle and was about to agree, when he
paused, and placed a bare hand on the side of one of the sheltering boulders.
“Do you feel that?” he asked. “A vibration.”
    Thad placed his own ungloved hand on the same rock.
“Tremor?”
    Koban had quite a few active volcanoes, and was geologically
active.
    “I don’t think so. It’s steady, and I’ve been feeling it
through my back for some time as I leaned against the rock face. It finally
grew strong enough that I took notice.”
    Thad looked out at the yak herd. “We aren’t the only ones to
notice, or else they are causing it. The bulls have changed direction to our
left, and have picked up the pace. Look at the snow they’re kicking up.”
    “The vibration wasn’t coming from that herd,” Dillon hooked
his thumb towards the yaks. “They just now started running. Doesn’t it feel
like that stampede of rhinolo we triggered, a couple of months back? We shot a
cow, and before we landed, we chased a big herd away from the kill using the
shuttle. It felt like this through my feet.”
    “If it isn’t the yaks, then it must be some other stampede,”
agreed Thad, “because I’m starting to hear the sound, despite the muffling
effect of snow. It isn’t rhinolo, not this far north.  Let’s get up top. We
might be able to get our shots in before the yaks get too far away, and also catch
sight of what’s running our way.”
    They climbed out of their cozy rock and snow shelter, and as
they reached the top of the wind swept peak, they could see the source of the
distant rumble. It was an indistinct line of churning snow spray, a mile or
more to the right when they faced the still turning yak herd.
    “What do you think Thad, should we take our kills shots now
before they get farther away? Or do we wait to see what the hell’s coming?
We’re safe up here on the rocks.”
    “I’m thinking we should take our shots, but