“How beautiful was she?” Billie asked, scowling.


    Professor Kroft only smiled at me indulgently. “Surely not as pretty as you and I are, Billie. I think that’s what Sid meant.”


    “Yep. That’s what I meant.” I was grateful for the way out of the sticky situation. But why would Billie be jealous? She had her boyfriend, Mike. Wait. Or was it Scott?


    We stood by the sweetberry bushberries as I told the girls all about my strange encounter. Somehow, Professor Kroft had braided Billie’s hair into long pigtails. Billie looked good, kind of sporty, and ready for the day. She still didn’t have the greatest attitude, however.


    “The point is,” I continued, “that we’re not alone. I saw her, she was human…or she looked human at least. This is good. Also, she had arrows. We need help with arrows because I might be able to configure Betsy into a short bow.”


    Billie stopped scowling but now she was frowning. “But the professor can make arrows, right?”


    Professor Kroft put a hand on her chest. “I have an idea on how to make the arrowheads, but the fletching is beyond me. We should save the feathers from the ravens just in case we do befriend the mysterious huntress.”


    “Why does she get a cool name?” Billie asked. Then she caught herself. “Okay. That was petty. I’m just afraid. What if there is a tribe of Amazons, and they, you know, want to initiate us by having this huge lesbian orgy?”


    “We should be so lucky,” Professor Kroft whispered under her breath.


    Did I hear that right?


    Before it could fully register, the professor had another question for me. “Did you try and track her?”


    “I tried,” I said. But up there, at the top of the overhang, there’s only the limestone. I searched the game trails, but I didn’t see sandal footprints. If she is a huntress, she would know to hide her tracks.”


    “Drat,” the professor. “Good gravy, this is worrying.”


    “There!” Billie said loudly.


    “Where?” I was searching all around. Had Billie seen the beautiful huntress? And she was beautiful.


    But leave it to Billie to freak us out for nothing.


    Billie lowered her voice. “No. Not the huntress. This ‘good gravy’ thing. Who even says that? And drat? Did you really use the word ‘drat’?”


    Professor Kroft nodded. “Yes, Miss Kidd, I did. As for the expression, it comes from a Medieval English saying that compares the normal parts of life to meat and potatoes. The luxuries are referred to as the gravy. Good gravy. I can say ‘Good Grief’ if you prefer. Mother hated swearing, and so I found a way to curse around her.”


    I didn’t know what to say. Professor Kroft had never opened up to us like that, and I didn’t know a thing about her past. To me, she was simply my hot anthropology teacher.


    “Sorry,” Billie said quickly. “It’s fine. It’s just weird though.”


    The professor smiled. “I’m very strange, Ms. Kidd, but I’ve learned to embrace it. Studying other cultures has helped. What is considered bizarre in one culture is perfectly accepted in another, and yet, there is a truth that pervades all.”


    “What is that truth?” I asked.


    “Cultures thrive when people work together. It is our evolutionary advantage. We don’t have claws, we’re not particularly quick, and our skin makes for poor armor. Even our teeth don’t help us in combat. What we have is our intellect and our community. One man is easy to kill. A hundred men is harder. A thousand people, working together, is almost unstoppable.”


    “So we’ll work together,” I said.


    She nodded, her eyes soft on me. “We are working together. And you, Sid Marshall, shall be our weapon, our protector, our provider.”


    “That’s the plan,” I agreed.


    “I can do stuff,” Billie protested.


    “Comic relief?” I had to laugh at my own joke.


    Billie narrowed her eyes at first. Then she had to smile. “I do have a sense of humor, though you haven’t seen much of it. And I’m pretty. Your huntress might be a huge lesbian, and I can sweep her off her feet.”


    “You know,” Professor Kroft started slowly. “We also have your tribe of Amazons to consider. You leapt to the idea of an orgy rather quickly.”


    Billie blushed. “Gosh, let’s just continue our morning. What new horrors are we going to face today?”


    I switched my tool to an ax. “Probably more giant fleas. We have to retrieve our bag of crap and the last rifle from the bus. And your sandals.”


    “Maybe we’ll find another ring, and I can get a cool pair of boots like you.” Billie grabbed my arm and pulled me away down the path that lead through the giant redwoods toward the bus.


    “Above all,” I said, “we need to look for more power crystals.”


    We’d not gotten ten feet when a head popped up, making a fern sway. It was some kind of deer, or gazelle, with short antlers. Maybe it didn’t need big antlers because it had tusks.You could be reading stolen content. Head to Royal Road for the genuine story.


    The tusked deer was chewing on the fern, mouth working, looking at us with wary eyes. There were other deer beyond it, a whole little herd.


    I came to a stop, and Billie went to say something, but I managed to shush her with a finger to my lips, and she covered her hand with her mouth. This was our chance to get meat, and I was glad she wasn’t ruining it.


    Professor Kroft was smart enough to stop, going rigid.


    The tusked deer could bolt at any minute. They were big, far bigger than I would’ve thought, though everything in the forest was larger than normal.


    I reached back, and Professor Kroft handed me the rifle. It didn’t have a scope, though it did have iron sights. Pushing it to my shoulder, I didn’t waste any time.


    The deer retreated a little, but that was perfect for me.


    Its front legs were exposed…as was its chest.


    If these were like normal deer, they would have a heart right behind their front legs.


    I aimed right where the leg met the body. Gently, I squeezed the trigger without taking a breath.


    I couldn’t miss this shot. If we could get such a big animal, we could eat for days.


    No pressure, though.


    My shot surprised me, which was good. My aim was perfect.


    The plasma sizzled through the tusked deer, right where I wanted. It dropped to the ground while the other deer took off in a storm of hooves.


    I quickly ran forward, wanting to see how good my shooting was. At less than a hundred yards, I should’ve hit my mark.


    I did. I found the blast had eaten through the rib cage and through most of its lungs and heart. The meat was still sizzling. The plasma rifle wasn’t the best tool for hunting, but I didn’t trust myself with the javelin yet. I’d need to practice. Ideally, I’d craft a bow, which made me think of the huntress again.


    “Meats back on the menu, girls!” I said in triumph. “The bus is going to have to wait! Let’s see if we can find ourselves a kitchen back at Privacy Rock. But first, I’m hoping my new ax is sharp. Wish me luck.”


    Billie started clapping. “Oh my gosh, that was so epic! I can’t believe you got him!”


    Professor Kroft joined her. “Bravo, Mr. Marshall. If only we had some salt for curing. We could try smoking the meat, though we would have to be quick. The flies will come to ruin the meat. With the hot desert sun, drying the meat might also be an option, though I’m going to have to really try and remember some of my ancient meat curing class.”


    “I’m wondering how lunch is going to work with our vegetarian.” I had to tease Billie a little.


    She made a face. “I was scared yesterday. I know I have to eat meat, okay? It’s just not that healthy for you.”


    “Healthier than not eating, right?” Why was I needling her? This was a mistake, and yet, I couldn’t help myself.


    “We had the berries,” Billie said in her defense. “That was our carb, and we got phytonutrients from them, but we need a protein, so yes, I’m totally going to eat the deer. Don’t tease.” Then she actually pouted.


    I kind of actually felt bad. “I won’t tease.”


    Thumbing the edge of the ax, it felt sharp.


    I got to work, slitting open the belly. I wished I had an actual knife, but I didn’t want to use my last tool configuration on a blade just yet. Besides, the bag of crap had those little bits of metal.


    In the end, I didn’t have to do that good of a job cleaning it. We didn’t have a way of preserving the meat, and so we’d mostly eat the big muscles on the animal’s haunches.


    The ax was very sharp, and that helped me.


    Normally, I wouldn’t have gone after such big prey, since it took a lot of energy to deal with the meat, and there was a good chance it would bring in predators. However, it had been right there, and we were hungry. It would take a bit for our bodies to adjust to less food.


    I remembered cleaning deer that I’d shot while hunting with Uncle Marty. For them, we’d cut out the butthole while being extra careful not to nick the intestines. I wasn’t going to really worry about that with the tusked deer I’d shot.


    I ended up quartering the deer. I might’ve been able to carry the entire carcass, but it was big, massive. We were going to be able to eat meat for days.


    Turns out, I was far stronger than I thought. Muscles glowing, I hefted the haunches onto my shoulders and only had to make two trips. Sure, my survival suit got dirty, but those bloodstains would soon be gone, absorbed and cleaned by the material.


    Back at Privacy Rock, we found our kitchen. There was a flat rock, under a tall mushroom tree, next to a little stream that trickled away from the pond. It was the perfect place.


    It wasn’t raining, but it still took a bit to find dry wood.


    Like I said, everything in the forest was big. I found a fallen tree, and when I shoved it aside, a centipede the size of my arm sped away on a million legs. I was pretty sure it hissed at me before it fled. And there was a spider the size of a cat with a web between two other smaller pines. The thing was colorful and easy to see, but something that big did get my arachnophobia going.


    I had the girls gather dry grass, so I could use it to start the fire. My welding torch gave me the initial flame.


    While I thought I would have a hard time skinning the animal with the ax, it was sharp enough and there was enough of an angle, I was able to take the hide off relatively easily.


    “We need to hang the other pieces of meat, but we don’t really have rope. There was some wire in our bag of crap, but not enough. And the elastic bands wouldn’t help us either.”


    Professor Kroft found some massive reeds growing along the edge of the pond. Working the edges, she pulled off a length of plant. “We could weave these together to create rope. Billie, while Sid cooks, come and help me gather the strands, and then we can work on braiding them.”


    “Like hair?” Billie asked.


    “Very similar,” the professor replied.


    I never would’ve thought an anthropology professor would be so useful out in the bush, trying to survive. Then again, she’d studied how our ancestors had survived long enough to invent microwaves and Costcos.


    Normally, Uncle Marty would hang his deer up for a day or so, to let the blood drain off it. That was a way of tenderizing it and adding flavor, but at the moment, I was hungry. The raven meat from the the night before wasn’t all that filling, and the sweetberries were only going to hold back the hunger for so long.


    Like most Americans, I was used to trying not to eat too many calories, and so my intake on a regular basis had trained my body to expect a variety of food at certain intervals.


    I was missing intervals, and I felt it.


    I found two Y-shaped branches and with some random rocks, I was able to anchor them to create a spit. Then, I turned the meat, roasting it over the flames. The sizzling meat had me hungry, and I was overjoyed to see that Billie and Professor Kroft had woven us several yards of rope. It looked pretty rough, knotted together, but it seemed strong.


    But where to hang it? And where were we going to sleep that night?


    The bus had been so comfortable. The overhang at Privacy Rock didn’t really give us an escape route if we found ourselves facing a predator. I didn’t want to get boxed in, and I knew that the pool would draw both prey and predator.


    No, we’d have to return to the branches of our redwood tree, though that wasn’t ideal either. We didn’t know if there were giant eagles or any other animals that might swoop down on us. Besides, at that height, if we did run into trouble, falling was a real possibility.


    I wanted to build us a shelter, but there were the monsters to consider. Part of me wished I’d simply gone and done some recon during the Jurassic Park battle the night before, just to get a sense of what they were.


    We needed to do some hardcore exploring.


    First though, we’d eat, secure our meat, and retrieve our gear from the bus, and then I was going to find us a good place to sleep that night. Along the way, I hoped we’d find more power crystals.


    Like us, Opal needed to eat.