Chapter 5

Just as I pulled the trigger, I realized the muzzle blast would be something unknown to any of the hunters. Thankfully, I had the sense to remain still after the shot. I didn’t dare move. By straining my eyes around, I could tell all the hunters were looking around, trying to see where the noise had come from.

Luckily, all the canyon walls around here had probably disguised the direction. I was also lucky there was plenty of underbrush around me. Finally, after much mumbling among themselves, the hunters turned back to their tasks of finishing off the prey and then set to cleaning it. They left the large buck for last, seeming afraid to approach it for a while. They did eventually, though.

It must have been about an hour or so after I’d shot the large buck. The man I took to be the leader of the hunting party and the man who flushed the game down the small valley sucked up their nerve and approached the large buck. They touched it tentatively at first, but finally set to gutting and then skinning it. As they finished, a shout came from down the main valley, and with the glasses, I could see more people approaching.

Two more men and four more women were coming to join those already here. When the new arrivals came up, everyone gathered, and I assumed they were greeting each other. It seemed they were speaking, but I wasn’t close enough to be sure. Soon, they all went to work packing their fresh meat onto pack frames. They had cut the deer up into manageable sizes and were preparing to leave. A few were washing out intestines and such, but soon they finished, and I could tell they intended to pack everything back to their camp tonight.

It was nearing sunset when they bundled up and left. I let them get about a half to three-quarters of a mile ahead of me, and then I followed, staying close to the valley wall or hidden in the scattering of trees as I went.

Their clothes had been made of skins, of course. Men and women both wore a type of trousers, and they all had large tunic-type garments for the top. They were bare-headed, and for footwear, they had some type of moccasin, which extended up under their trouser legs and seemed to be tied around with leather thongs.

I hadn’t searched for any information about their physical size before I left, and I was slightly surprised to see they seemed about the same size as the people of the Earth I’d left. The one I’d assumed was the leader looked to be about six feet tall and probably weighed around one eighty or one ninety. The women were smaller, but all seemed to be at least five four. There weren’t any fatties for sure. All of them were in fighting trim, and it seemed the women were carrying almost as much a load on the way back as the men were.

It took them about two hours to reach their camp, and it was apparent everyone was waiting up for them. There was a large fire going near the center of the campsite, and when the hunters returned, it didn’t take long for some of the fresh meat to find itself being cooked.

They had one large dwelling built against the side of the canyon. It appeared to be made of wood, animal bones, tusks, and rock, with animal hides covering a structural framework. The women kept going in and out of it for things to use in the cooking, but the men only went in to stow their gear and came back out to sit around. They were drinking something from a large bag made from some of the inner workings of an animal. As I watched for a while, the men were getting a little more boisterous, and I assumed they had discovered strong drink. Things were looking up already.

I felt like a party crasher or a voyeur after a while. With the night vision goggles, I could plainly see the goings-on, especially since the moon and stars were particularly bright, and the night sky was clear. Finally, I decided all the men seemed to have one woman for a mate, and eventually, I could determine which woman was mated to which man. There were more women than men, and it soon was clear to me the unmated women were the younger ones.