A new original short story

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Through BookFunnel, we have for this month Strong Female Protagonists in SF/F. And who is a stronger female than Dr. Ellie Parsons of Brian, Created Intelligence? Grab a book, follow an author here FREE BOOKS!

I share with you now an original and very different sort of science fiction short story, one about elk hunting. I wrote this a couple years back and now there is a service to help bring game meat back with the tech at the end of this story. I found it fun and refreshing to write, almost poetic to imagine and feel the great outdoors as my fingers laid upon my keyboard. An homage to a time honored tradition, and a thought of the future. I hope you enjoy, and if you don’t, well this is the only thing I’ve written quite like this. Cheers.

WHOSE HUNT IS THIS?

The straps dug into my shoulders as my booted feet gripped and pushed against chiseled gray rock and bright yellow yet withered sunflowers. My brow was dew covered in sweat as my eyes looked out over the mountains, golden dawn glinted back into my face. Gloves were not only necessary, they were crucial in this cold, my breath and the silver lined frosted grass both steaming as rays of sun crest over them. My pack was heavy, too heavy. I had stuffed too much in, and I hadn’t even harvested an animal yet. My rifle stuck out vertical, the sun showing me its shadow over my head as I continued to summit the mountain to glass. I was searching, hunting for elk, two full days in, but I had a tag for a bear too, just in case, meat was meat. You never know what the country will deliver, and some years it was nothing at all.

Fifty yards from the ridge line of mottled tree and grass, I stopped to draw a quick sip from my camelbak, the translucent blue straw dangling like a shaken limb as my lips let go. My face was three days unshaven, a nice rough that almost kept a touch of the cold away. And then from the corner of my eye, I saw a flash of brown. I kept absolutely still, frozen in two different ways. With a large tan coat pulled tight against hundreds of pounds of meat my family could eat for half the year, a cow elk trotted near the ridge two hundred yards off. She was broadside for a good twelve seconds before she turned away, moving through the trees, vanishing into the wilderness. I waited.

Where one was, there were sure to be more. Slowly, I tried to hover down to a knee to rest, the grass still green on the mountaintop. It would be a good idea to take my rifle off my pack as well, maybe even leave the damned pack here if I found-holy hell. As large as tree limbs I first saw the rack, it must have been a seven by seven. Blood pulsed and throbbed, my heart panging against my chest. I stayed so still my legs ached in position. A thick, shaggy dark brown neck and slender legs moved the bull from the formation of rock from where the cow had come. He never bugled. I hoped he’d turn away, but he stopped out in the open, my 7mm magnum still strapped in tight to my backpack, the straps digging into me after day on end lugging way too much across and over these mountains. Never again would I take this much stuff. I bit my lip in anticipation. He seemed wary, these old bulls are smart, and he was pointing towards me with his hulking, muscly self. I held my breath.

The sway of those huge antlers with ivory tips enlivened me, adrenaline now rushing through my body. He turned toward the cow, trotting after her, all I could see were the brown and tan haunches and the rack of the monster. As soon as he disappeared I shook off my pack, the weight lifting from my shoulders was like a body massage all itself. Silently, I unstrapped my rifle and shook the cotton sock off of it. I already had cartridges on the stock on a slip over sleeve, I opened the bolt and scurried as silent-quickly as I could to the behemoth as I slipped in a 7mm loaded brass and closed it shut, the oiled click would have sounded good, but the thumping of elk fever took ahold of me, pounding my eyes, neck veins, and ears as my booted feet whisked me toward the pair.

Suddenly, I stopped. I heard something behind me as I was entering the small island of trees which overtook both sides of this ridge. Almost a buzzing, a humming, something odd. I craned my neck carefully, not seeing anything but a hawk high in the sky, on his own pursuit. I continued on, my boots of waterproofed leather and knobby rubber tore into the ground as my eyes scoured from one elk hoof to the next. Pine needles in front of my face, I pushed them out of the way, the ragged bark gently cracking and falling to the ground as my gloved hand almost felt warmer with this ultimate rush.

SNAP! My boot cracked a twig in half, right after I heard the two move further away from me. But I had gained on them from where my pack lay. Breath no longer steamy in the light of the warming day, I pushed on, moving out gently toward the openness surrounding this larger-than-I-thought island of trees. Up ahead, far away in the distance, I spotted several brown spots. My binoculars confirmed, it was an entire herd of cow and calf, five hundred yards or more from my position. I didn’t have a cow tag. I was after a bull, this seven by seven monster. I could see it in my mind, my pulling the trigger, screaming silently from the mountaintop into oblivion with joy and pride, packing out the wild beast and sizzling up medallions for my kids and wife. I could feel it, I could taste it.

The sky was a medium blue at this altitude, the fresh clean air and green grass made me feel that much more alive, as if I needed it, fresh on the heels of a monster bull elk. Rifle over my shoulder, my gloved hand stealthily holding the stock, I hiked up through the grass, I saw through the edges of the island of tree, it disintegrated into meadow. Shadow stalked. Fifty yards away, I felt the presence looming near as I handled my rifle into position in my right arm. My left held my binoculars. The cow elk was laying in the grass, licking herself. I browsed, the trees right in front of me blurring fiercely as my ten-times zoom scoured for more elk tan-and-brown. White points on dead-dark antlers, ivory tipped. Fourteen points in all. Again the flood of adrenaline hit me, my brow and hands sweated profusely, luckily my gloves caught the moisture, as my rifle surely would have fallen from my grip.

I took three steps forward, the seven millimeter round pointed through the slitted section of woods, my scope at three and a half times zoom, a much larger viewing area than my stuck in place binoculars. I heard that humming again, a zipping above me. I couldn’t see it, but I knew that sound. It was, unnatural, but almost normal, a kind of I’ve-gotten-used-to-it sound. A mindless zip-hum above me. I looked up, taking my rifle from my shoulder, blue sky. I heard it zip quickly, a rushing kind of zip, out toward my meat and antlered brethren of the bush. I knew that sound but could not pinpoint it for the life of me. I shouldered my rifle again, this nonsense wasn’t going to ruin my chance of a lifetime. The big bull was in my crosshairs, I just needed it to turn a few more degrees for a healthy quartering shot. The antlers were enormous, pumping my blood, my hands shook slightly as its tail whipped its buttocks. My eye relieved from the edge of my scope as the hum grew, I saw a huge bird staring at the elk from above. The humming kept on. I pointed my eye’s attention to the large bird only fifteen yards from and fifty feet above the monster elk I was about to harvest. It was no bird. It had blades moving at thousands of rotations per minute, a slender metal tube dropped down. It was so bizarre I couldn’t take my eyes of off it. And then I saw it, that slender tube, which was pointed toward my elk, I had a sick feeling form in my gut. This was a drone, with a rifle attached to it. Before I could move my crosshairs back to the elk to take a shot-

CRACK!

It was all over. The elk reared up and tore off. I saw the impact tremor of the bullet. I yelled, “NO!” and stormed toward the damned thing as it hovered slowly to the downed animal. All I could see of it were its antlers sticking up as high as a young tree in the meadow.

“NO!” I called again, furious. My body pushed through the island of trees and out to the other side and into the meadow. The herd of cows were long gone already, as was the cow that accompanied this now dead, beautiful trophy bull.

The black helicopter apparatus still moved toward the animal. I rose my weapon, angry with this unbelievable outcome. My mind was on fire. It turned around immediately. The rifle barrel lowering down yet again, it zipped to me, fifteen yards away and five feet off the ground, it floated with unnatural agility and sound. A robotic voice spewed from it as I stared at the barrel.

“Cease and desist. To proceed will end your life.”

I shouted at it. “That was my bull! Goddammit!”

“It is over. Turn back now. This elk is now property of H.E. Enterprises. Turn back now or risk lethal force.”

I turned back, fuming, screaming, as angry and confused and shocked as I’d ever been in my entire life. As I hit the set of trees in which I had spotted the beast only ten minutes before, alive and stunningly beautiful, I turned back around, seeing metallic arms unfolding from the drone, cutting into my animal, taking my meat and hide for someone not worth enough to do it themselves. I walked back down to my pack and hiked to the next ridge.

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Thank you so much for being a part of this writing experience I have initiated.

AJ