The Fields Tinged with Red

The Fields Tinged with Red-2

“He was alone—hunting, I mean, without a pack,” said Selena. “Don’t you think that’s kind of, well, odd?”

Nick sipped his coffee and gazed out at the fields (they’d found a butane countertop range in one of the cupboards), trying not to look at the sky, which was clear and blue yet full of things he could not explain: chief among them a curtain of color which shimmered like the Aurora Borealis (even in broad daylight) and an array of glowing shapes—like vertical arrowheads—which recalled for him the prisms of a crystal chandelier.

“After what’s happened?” He laughed. “Define odd.” He shook his head. “No—not really. I mean, I don’t know. Maybe he’s what they call a ‘rogue male’—an apex predator in search of his own clan; or a clan to take over. Or maybe when this, this Flashback, as you called it, occurred, he was whisked away from his pack and found himself here, in the middle of the Palouse. The, ah, breadbasket of Washington State.” He stood abruptly and began pacing the deck. “What the hell would I know, anyway. I’m a shoe salesman with a yapping mouth.”

“Yeah, well.” She stood and moved toward the kitchen. “Maybe a yapping mouth isn’t such a bad thing—in a world without people.” She turned and gave him an almost flirty smile—which he knew not to read into—then raised her empty cup. “More coffee?”

“Sure,” he said.

Then she faced forward and ran smack into Teddy, who gripped her shoulders even as she slapped his hands away. “And good morning to you, too,” he said.

He walked around and settled into a chair. “What are you rabbits conspiring about out here, anyway?”

“Oh, you know,” drawled Nick. “Cost of everything goin’ up: Beef and eggs and pasta and dried beans. Can’t get a soda down at the jerk without splitting a vein. And these so-called predatory dinosaurs, well, don’t even get me started.”

Teddy chuckled and shook his head. “Yuh. I almost forgot. You got’ a smart remark for everything.”

“Mom always said; she said, when you die, they’ll have to beat your mouth to death with a stick.”

“That what she said?”

“That’s what she said.”

“Mm.” He spat for the first time that morning and looked out over the green fields. “Any sign of our friend?”

“Not hide nor sickle-claw.”

But Teddy had focused on something; something out by the freshly painted barn (which nonetheless leaned precariously; a result of the hurricane-like winds that had attended the Flashback, no doubt), and frowned. “You sure about that?”

“What do you mean?” Nick followed his gaze but saw nothing, only a rusted-out van and some equally rusted drums, and something he hadn’t noticed before (probably because they hadn’t been there, he was sure of it): a stand of hoary cycad bushes. Literally—cycad bushes. In rolling wheat country. In Eastern Washington. After a bitter winter.

“I’m afraid I don’t—”

But there was something; something partially obscured by the van and the cycad bushes; something brown and tan and red and mottled green; a thing which didn’t move, didn’t breathe, which didn’t even seem to be alive—until it adjusted its head slightly and he could no longer miss it, no longer even look away.

“Oh, he’s a ninja, that one,” said Selena, having joined them at the railing. “A real cucumber. Silent Jim; that’s his name.”

“Shhh,” whispered Teddy.

“I don’t get it,” said Nick. “I mean, is he just curious, or is he afraid, is he stalking us, wh—”

“Jesus, gods, would you be quiet?” Teddy appeared taught as a whip. “And bring me that goddamn rifle. Hurry.”

He mumbled as Selena fetched it: “How you too are ever going to survive a dinosaur f*****g apocalypse is beyond me.” He reached for the weapon as she approached but she hesitated before handing it over. “What? What is it?” he grumbled.

“Nothing, it’s nothing,” she said, and handed him the gun. “It’s just that, maybe this isn’t a good idea.”

He braced his elbow on the railing and aimed even as Nick looked at her sharply. “What are you talking about?”

“I mean, what if it’s the wrong thing? What if it turns out we need those bullets more than we’ll need that beef? Or what if it’s some kind of ambush, or—”

“Shut her up or I will,” growled Teddy, even as he eyed the scope and fingered the trigger. “We’ve got one shot at—”

She took a step closer. “Wait—”

And there was a crack! and a recoil and the shot echoed along the hills, even as Nick looked and saw the animal darting into the brush and zigzagging through the tall grass—before tripping once (but just as quickly recovering) and vanishing into a stand of trees.

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