Chapter 6

More progress was made in the days immediately following the killing of the cougar than at any time so far. The youngsters memories told them how to use animal fat and lye leached from wood to make soap. The girls in particular were keen to make soap, despite the fact that they had never used it before.

Adam was able to splinter some of the cougar's bones and a number of benefits came from that. Several needles were possible and also much sharper tips for their spears.

Sarah used the shells to carefully cut the finished rawhide and was able to make very basic kilts for all of them. David was of course very disappointed that three pussies and three well-toned asses were now covered up and his viewing pleasure was much reduced. He was unsure about hunting any more animals for fear that the girls might cover up their breasts next.

Some of the rawhide had been painstakingly cut into strips and these were useful for another couple of things. David took four of the strips to use as snares to try to catch some rabbits to supplement their diet. He took two more to begin to experiment with making a bow using the rawhide as the bowstring.

David also was true to his word and made a replacement spear for Adam, this time incorporating some sharp cougar bone as the tip.

The girls took to having baths with the soap in the river. All three of them suspected that David was spying on them, but all of the twins were coming to accept his voyeurism as a compensation for not having a mate. Hannah continued to be particularly happy at the thought of him watching her.

Over the course of the next week David caught eight rabbits and they were eaten along with more cougar, fish, shellfish and some wild onions that Hannah had found. The rabbit proved to be something of a disappointment as the meat tasted quite bland.

David's fears were confirmed when the girls used the rabbit skins to make matching kilts and coverings for their boobies. He had to admit that the little garments did make the girls look even sexier though and he was still able to watch them naked when they bathed.

The next major event was sparked by Ben having another streak of showing initiative and taking some decisions. While they were all settling down for the night around the fire, he raised the issue of food.

"Listen guys, I think we need to think a bit more about food. We might be okay right now, but the cougar meat is going to be finished soon and I'm not looking forward to just having fish again."

"What, do you want me to go out and kill another mountain lion?" Adam joked and the others laughed.

"No, but we need to try to kill something else before the meat runs out," chuckled Ben.

"What are you suggesting oh great leader?" Sarah asked, smiling to take any heat out of her tease.

"I think we need to plan and organise a hunt."

No one spoke for a few minutes as they were all searching their memories for what they knew about hunting. There was such a huge amount of information available that none of them could make much sense of it.

"Did you have something particular in mind?" asked Elizabeth.

"If David had made better progress with his bow it would be easier, but I have thought of one or two ways we might be able to kill something," said Ben.

The other six were now listening intently. Food was still a huge issue for them they knew and if Ben had come up with a way of giving them access to more of it then it would be an important breakthrough.

"Are you going to tell us, or do we need to beat it out of you?" joked Adam.

"Both methods are similar," Ben started, "we need to find some game and then we need to drive it in a particular direction. That's going to involve some effective teamwork.

"The first and maybe easiest way would be if we could drive something over the cliffs so that it falls and dies. The second is for our most accurate spearmen to wait for the rest of us to drive the game close enough so they have a shot at throwing their spears at them."

They all shared looks. It sounded so simple when Ben said it, why hadn't any of them thought of this?

"Is it really that simple?" asked Hannah.

"It might sound simple, but I'm not sure my mate has thought of everything," said Sarah.

"Like what?" Ben asked.

"Like finding game close enough to the cliffs to make it possible. Like what happens if the game turns on us? Like the game will probably be able to run faster than we can so 'herding' it won't be as straightforward as you suggest. And like where there's game, there's likely to be predators too, so we would need to be careful."

Ben nodded his head to show that he accepted all the things his twin had said.

"It still sounds as if it's worth a try," said Elizabeth, "what do you think Thomas?"

Thomas shrugged. There was still food left so he wasn't sure why they needed to discuss this subject now.

"I think we should try it tomorrow," said David. "Why don't I go up onto the escarpment above the cliffs and try to find some game. If I find some I can come back and get you and we can try to drive some over the cliffs."

They agreed that it would be worth giving it a go and spent some more time before sleep discussing how they would organise themselves to drive the game.

All of them were up early with the prospect of the hunt - although Thomas had to be nagged by Elizabeth. They made their way to the cliffs and David looked for an easy way up. The three sets of twins had agreed they would spend the time waiting for David's return by looking for flint and some caves that might offer a better place to make their base.

The river that flowed close to their current campsite cascaded down from the escarpment in a quite spectacular waterfall. They found a cave behind the waterfall, but it was too cold for them to consider it as a home so they crossed behind the curtain of water and carried on their search further on.

They hadn't walked much beyond the waterfall when the saw David running towards them waving his arms. He looked excited and that could only mean that he had found some game and the hunt was on! They retraced their steps and hurried to meet him.

"Deer! I've found a small herd of deer, eight of them and not far from the cliffs. If we hurry we might have a chance," he panted.

The climb up the cliff wasn't too bad but they took their time anyway, being careful to avoid anyone falling. David led the way and they all tried to be extra quiet to avoid frightening the deer before they were in position. The twins didn't know it, but David took them on a loop so they could come up to the deer from behind and be in the perfect place to force them towards the cliff.

Adam and Hannah scuttled out to the right hand side to try to keep the deer from running off and getting away. The river was on that side too and it would help hedge the deer in. Ben and Sarah did the same on the left leaving David, Elizabeth and Thomas to approach the deer directly.

They got their first sight of the herd a few minutes later. There was one buck, five does and two babies in the bunch. All three of the girls had immediate qualms about the youngest deer - this wasn't something they had considered, but there was no way of cutting them out of the drive easily.

It didn't take the deer long to catch their scent and they began to drift over towards Adam and Hannah. Both of them kept low and took a firmer grip on their spears. Adam saw David waving and realised their error. To keep the deer from being able to escape, they would need to show themselves to frighten them off from trying to run in this direction. Adam grabbed Hannah's hand and pulled her to her feet.

The deer saw them immediately and were spooked enough to run. This time they ran towards Ben and Sarah and the water-twins stood up to head them off before they could get beyond them.

By now the deer were panicking but they only had one direction they could go and that was towards the cliff. They raced forward. But stopped when they reached the edge. The buck turned, lowered his head and pawed the ground. All of the youngsters were taking a close look at his antlers and none of them liked the idea of having to take him on.

One of the does was possibly more panicked than the others and she suddenly launched herself off of the cliff. Adam saw this and tugged Hannah as he ran towards the central group, opening an escape route for the remainder of the herd.

The buck didn't need a second invitation and he led his family through the gap as quickly as they could run. The youngsters walked to the cliff-edge and peered over. The doe was visible at the foot of the cliff. Its head was at an awkward angle suggesting it had broken its neck in the fall so at least it wouldn't have been in pain.

Grins broke out on the faces of the youngsters. They had proved to themselves that they could hunt and kill meat for themselves. For a group who had little experience of doing anything for themselves, this was a major step forward. They all walked along the cliff until they found their route back down from the escarpment and then tried to find the dead doe.

Once they returned to the lower ground, finding the deer was much more difficult than they had expected. They had to form a line and walk parallel to each other and at right angles to the cliff before they stumbled across the body.

The search turned up an unexpected bonus however, when Elizabeth called out to the others that she had found something else.

"What is it?" Thomas asked his twin.

"I'm not sure, but I think it might be coal," she replied.

The others gathered round and looked at the seam that was visible on the cliff face. A pile of loose coal was littered on the ground that Elizabeth was standing on and the fuel would prove to be a major help to the youngsters in taking their progress onto another level.

"This is fantastic! You do realise what this means?" Ben asked excitedly.

"What? It's only coal, admittedly that means we can continue to heat ourselves if it gets colder," said Thomas.

"No, think about it. You've all got the same inherited memories as I have. Why is coal so important?" Ben challenged them.

The other youngsters concentrated and searched their own memories to try to identify why Ben was so excited. Eventually it was Sarah who offered an answer.

"Are you thinking about coke?" she asked.

"Exactly! Coke! If we can make coke then we have one of the main things required for making steel. Coal on its own will help us fire ovens that can melt iron, but with coke we can make steel and that will be much better," said Ben.

"If we can fire an oven does that mean we can bake clay to make crockery?" asked Hannah.

"Of course, why didn't I think of that! Some bowls and stuff would certainly make life easier."

"But we don't have any iron," said Thomas, returning to Ben's original excitement. "You're getting all excited about steel and we don't even have any iron."

"Well we'll just have to find some," replied Hannah, still happy about the idea of eating out of a bowl.

The deer was much easier to carry back to the campsite as it weighed much less than the cougar had. Ben warned the girls not to think about using the hide to make more clothing as he had other plans for it.

"What's more important than making more clothes?" demanded Elizabeth.

"I'm going to try to make a bellows that will help increase the heat in our oven," Ben replied.

"But we don't even have an oven!" Elizabeth complained.

"We will have soon," was Ben's response.

The camp was a happy place that night as the youngsters let their excitement bubble over with each suggestion for an improvement that was made. The deer meat was also exceptionally tasty - even better than the mountain lion - and their success in planning and carrying out a hunt was also something to celebrate.

The next few days were taken up for most of them in helping Ben make the first oven. He chose a site close enough to the coal to allow easy access to fuel, but also close enough to the river to ensure he also had plenty of clay and water to hand.

"I want the girls to start to make clay bricks and lay them out to dry. We're going to need a lot of bricks so I think you should plan on being here for quite a while," said Ben.

The girls groaned, but walked off to find a good spot to start their work.

"What about us?" asked Adam.

"I could use one of you to help me start to move some coal over to where the oven is going to be, but the other two can find something else to do. On second thoughts, if two of you move coal, I can make a start on trying to turn the deer hide into a set of bellows."

"I'm going to go out and scout for more game," said David and he scampered off before the others could argue.

Thomas wasn't happy about the idea of moving coal - it sounded like too much hard work for his liking - but David had been quick off the mark so he grumbled, and moved off with Adam to start to shift some coal.