His feet slapped against the boulder as he clambered up it.

The drums still beat.

Badum-badum-badum.

Were they only in his head? Was it just his heartbeat, thudding in his chest?

His chest burned with each breath, and he remembered suddenly that he'd been running.

Looking down at himself, he saw that he'd torn off his coolsuit - or most of it, at least. He still wore the bottom half, which was still working.

His upper body was covered in perspiration, it poured from his brow. But his system told him that the temperature and humidity in the night were . . . well, tolerable.

He saw red on his chest, fearing for a moment he was injured and did not even know it. But no, it was not blood, but red ochre. Looking at himself, he saw that he had painted himself.

It was not the crude pictographs that he'd used before. These were new . . . And while he could not even understand all that he had put on himself, it felt right; it felt like something true to himself.

The sounds of the !Xomyi, scrambling through the undergrowth, reached him. He had left them behind . . . Yes, because he'd been running as fast as his legs could take him. Fast of Wing, the only one who could stay ahead of him, was guiding the way.

He started off again, following the flash of white. Leading them, Fast of Wing had put white marks on his back that he could see in the dark.

His toes- his feet bare, he realized, he'd shed his moccasins - gripped the smooth rock, and he climbed up it, leaping off to a log, then down to the ground.

The drums kept pounding in his ears.

Badum-badum-badum.

His companions were no longer the alien !Xomyi. In the dark, he could only see their shapes, and they were human men, like himself.

He was a human when the world felt young, from a time when man was still just an animal who lived at the whim of a world that held no love for any of her children.

And he was here . . . he was here to kill the beast that hunted them.

He wanted to whoop, to cry out like an animal, but he knew he must stay quiet. He clambered over rocks, ducked under branches, his feet finding his way through leaves and underbrush, leaving - at least he thought - no trace of his passing.

Might I be the loudest thing in this jungle? He might be. Part of him knew he could only keep up with his compatriots because of the enhancements made to his muscles that made them stronger than any ancient human.

That part of his conscious brain still existed, but only as an onlooker, commenting to his mind that seemed possessed by some ancient self.

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It was not real, he told himself. But it felt real. He felt like he could imagine how it must have been to be a man in such a time.

The world held endless bounty, endless possibilities, endless dangers and fears.

He clutched his spear. The obsidian head glinted in hints of moonlight from Omen above. Anything that he met would die on its point.

Fast of Wing let out a cry, a bird whistle. He knew without knowing how that it meant they had reached their place. He came to a stop, ducking low.

The other !A!amo came up, forming around him. They watched him with eyes of awe; but in another moment that changed entirely, and he was simply one of them; they were men like he, but truly men of the past. They accepted him.

Which was the truth, he did not know. Both, perhaps. At the same time.

Fast of Wing spoke quietly.

"It sleeps within. I will wait here. Aim true, Gift Giver."

The cave was merely a crevice between two rocks. It gaped, a dark abyss that could mean his death.

It did not even occur to him to draw his sidearm. He held his spear ready, and approached the gap. He did not know if something might come out at him.

Nothing was there. His enhanced eyes could scan the darkness, and saw no shapes, only the gaping darkness. The hole was big enough that he could almost crouch-walk in.

Getting on his belly, he slid in carefully. The others of his tribe came in with him, all quietly.

Was he being quiet enough? He could not tell over the endless drum beat that continued in his ears.

Badum-badum-badum.

The crevice led to a larger cave than he expected. It widened out, and he rose to his feet, walking across rough ground.

His feet touched something long and hard, and he looked down, in the gloom barely able to see that it was a bone.

It was not from a !Xomyi, it was too large. But in his state of mind, he took it for human.

His heart was now beating hard in his chest, with the drumbeat, building upon it, their mix becoming one.

The !Xomyi of his tribe were behind him, moving stealthily. In its sleep, the keko!un was less aware, but it could still wake up. And even half-asleep, in this confined space, they'd be dead.

There! The cave narrowed, winding to the side, but he could tell it was in there. It had to be, it was the place that made the most sense. His senses were attuned, he could imagine himself in the skin of the animal, thinking how it thought.

He crept forward, his heart and the drums in perfect synchrony in his head.

Badum-badum-badum.

It was there. Curled up, its back towards him. If it awoke and unfolded, it would be looking right at him. It would take him in its jaws, as it had taken Hard Biter, and he'd be done.

The !Xomyi were behind him. He could feel their apprehension, their excitement.

The part of him that could still think cried out for him to pause.

This was just an animal. It was asleep. There was no rightness in this, there was no justice, who even knew if it was the one that had killed Hard Biter? It wasn't even brave.

But the part of him that beat in time with the drum knew differently.

There was no rightness. There was no justness. There was survival. This creature, all of them, would be dead soon.

But this one could still strike them, could still kill, in the time that was still left.

He remembered the fangs of the keko!un puncturing Hard Biter's face, into his eye sockets, how the warrior had died in such an awful way in a moment of triumph. He thought of the children, who would have died from a fever, no matter that they were innocent and had so much life ahead of them.

There was only survival.

All of his body was one unit, he felt his muscles tense, and with one sinuous movement he lunged.

The keko!un stirred, hearing his feet slap on the rocks.

It turned just enough to present a target.

His spear bit into it just behind the skull, driving into it, cutting its spine, and continuing on.

He struck true, and the keko!un died without even a sound.