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.Many had had their eyes and facial features removed.They were chanting.I must admit that in a perverse kind of way, there was something almost beautiful in the tableau.’‘As an atheist,’ Hunter said, ‘I could not look upon such depredation with sufficient objectivity to appreciate any beauty.As far as I’m concerned, their cult is a sick tragedy.’‘They could be helped,’ Dr Fischer said tentatively.Hunter grunted a laugh.‘I somehow doubt that your ministrations would meet with their approval.’The three men drank on in silence.At length, talk turned to the expedition.Alvarez indicated the huge tracked bison he had transported from Million.The vehicle sat in the drive beside the hotel, loaded with provisions — food, water, weapons and, Hunter noticed, a collapsible cage lashed to the side.‘All is ready,’ Alvarez said.‘We set off at dawn.Your wife’s radio beacons are transmitting, and all we have to do is follow them.Our progress should be considerably quicker than hers.We’ll be following the route she has carved through the jungle, and as we have four drivers working in shifts we’ll be able to journey throughout the night.I estimate that, if all goes well, we should arrive at the valley of the crash-landing within two weeks.Then you take over, Mr Hunter, and with luck on our side we should bring about the salvation of the Slarque.’Hunter restrained himself from commenting.The pain in his chest was mounting.He told himself that he should not worry - Dr Fischer had brought him back to life once; he could no doubt do so again, should it be necessary - but something instinctive deep within him brought Hunter out in hot and cold sweats of fear.Alvarez leaned forward.‘Hunter? Are you—?’Hunter clasped his chest.Pain filled his lungs, constricting his breathing.Dr Fischer, with surprising agility for a man his size, rounded the table and bent over Hunter.He slipped an injector from a wallet and sank it into Hunter’s neck.The cool spread of the drug down through his chest brought instant relief.He regained his breath little by little as the pain ebbed.Dr Fischer said, ‘You’ve undergone a rapid resurrection programme, Mr Hunter.Some minor problems are to be expected.At the first sign of the slightest pain, please consult me.’ The Doctor exchanged a quick glance with Alvarez, who nodded.Hunter excused himself and retired to his room.He lay on his bed for a long time, unable to sleep.The night sky flared with bright pulses of orange and magenta light, sending shadows flagging across the walls of the room.He thought of Sam, and the daughter he had yet to meet, somewhere out there in the interior.He cursed the day he had first heard of Tartarus Major, regretted the three years it had robbed from his life, that long away from his daughter.He slept fitfully that night, troubled by dreams in which Sam was running from the teeth and claws of the creature that had killed him.He was woken at dawn, after what seemed like the briefest of sleeps, by the ugly klaxon of the tracked bison.The vehicle was equipped to sleep eight - in small compartments little wider than the individual bunks they contained.It was invitation enough for Hunter.He spent the first six hours of the journey catching up on the sleep he’d lost during the night.He was eventually awoken by the bucketing yaw of the bison as it made the transition from the relatively smooth surface of a road to rough terrain.Hunter washed the sweat from his face in the basin above his bunk, then staggered through the sliding door.A narrow corridor ran the length of the vehicle to the control cabin, where a driver wrestled with the wheel, accompanied by a navigator.A ladder lead up to a hatch in the roof.He climbed into the fierce, actinic sunlight and a blow-torch breeze.Alvarez and Fischer were seated on a bench, swaying with the motion of the truck.Hunter exchanged brief greetings and settled to quietly watching the passing landscape.They had moved from the cultivated littoral to an indeterminate area of characterless scrubland, and were fast approaching the jungle-covered foothills that folded away, ever hazier, to a point in the distance where the crags of the central mountains seemed to float on a sea of cloud.They were following a route through the scrub which he and Sam had pioneered years ago in their own bison.The landmarks, such as they were - towering insects’ nests, and stunted, sun-warped trees - brought back memories that should have cheered him but which served only to remind him of Sam’s absence.As the huge sun surged overhead and the heat became furnace-like, Alvarez and Dr Fischer erected a heat-reflective awning.The three men sat in silence and drank iced beers.They left the scrubland behind and accelerated into the jungle, barrelling down the narrow defile torn through the dense undergrowth by Sam’s vehicle before them.It was minimally cooler in the shade of the jungle, out of the direct sunlight, but the absence of even a hot wind to stir the air served only to increase the humidity.Around sunset they broke out the pre-packaged trays of food and bulbs of wine, and ate to the serenade of calls and cries from the surrounding jungle.Hunter recognised many of them, matching physical descriptions to the dozens of songs that shrilled through the twilight.When he tired of this he said goodnight to Alvarez and the Doctor and turned in.He lay awake for a long time until exhaustion, and the motion of the truck, sent him to sleep.This routine set the pattern for the rest of the journey.Hunter would wake late, join Alvarez and the Doctor for a few beers, eat as the sun set, then retire and lie with his chaotic thoughts and fears until sleep pounced, unannounced.His chest pains continued, but, as Dr Fischer ordered, he reported them early, received the quelling injection and suffered no more.To counter boredom, he pointed out various examples of Tartarean wildlife to his fellow travellers, giving accounts of the habits and peculiarities of the unique birds and beasts.Even this pastime, though, reminded him of Sam’s absence: she would have told him to stop being so damned sententious.Seven days out of Apollinaire, they came to the clearing where Hunter had lost his life.Alvarez called a halt for a couple of hours, as they’d made good time so far.The driver slewed the bison to a sudden stop.The comparative silence of the clearing, after the incessant noise of the engine, was like a balm.Hunter jumped down and walked away from Alvarez and the others, wanting to be alone with his thoughts.The encampment was as Sam had left it on the day of the attack; the dome-tent located centrally, the battery of cameras set up peripherally to record the teeming wildlife.His heart pounding, Hunter crossed to where he judged the attack had taken place.There was nothing to distinguish the area; the disturbed earth had scabbed over with moss and plants, and the broken undergrowth in the margin of the jungle had regrown.He looked down the length of his new body, for the first time fully apprehending the miracle of his renewed existence.Overcome by an awareness of the danger, he hurried back to the truck.Sam had been this way - the tracks of her bison had patterned the floor of the clearing - but if she had left; any recorded message there was no sign, only the ubiquitous radio transmitter which she had dropped at intervals of a hundred kilometres along her route.They ate their evening meal in the clearing - a novelty after having to contend with the constant bucking motion of the truck at mealtimes so far.No sooner had the sun set, flooding the jungle with an eerie crimson night light, than they were aboard the bison again and surging through the jungle into territory new to Hunter
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