factory in Siberia that mass-produced ammunition for the AK-47 with solid silver bullet-heads, an eccentricity for which the programme makers could offer no convincing explanation.
The two definitely-not-werewolves-because-werewolves-don’t-exist, meanwhile, were running through the trees. Really running; it wasn’t something you could do while you were wearing the monkey-suit, because it only had two legs, and the musculature and cardiovascular set-up were rubbish. Really running was something else: a bit like flying, a bit like sex, a bit like having a race against your own body and winning. It had been weeks since they’d had a chance to run properly, and they made the most of it.
“Better?” panted one to the other, when they paused for breath.
“A bit,” the other replied. “Last one to the other end of the forest’s a human.”
They ran again. There was a complex technical reason why they could only do this at certain times. It had to do with where they’d left their ship. In order to hide it from the planet’s rudimentary sensors — telescopes, for crying out loud, and radio signals — they’d parked up in the lee of the absurdly large moon, and that was fine. Even though the moon was more or less in the way most of the time, the ship could still beam them enough power from its capacitor array to enable them to maintain human form. But there came a time, one or two lunar rotations in every thirty or so, when the moon blocked off the planet completely, blanking out the signal. During the daylight hours, it didn’t matter; they’d adapted their transceivers to scrounge enough energy from the sunlight to supplement their reserves of battery power and keep them monkey-shaped. But at night, when the sun went down and the great white moon rose fully round and bright, there simply wasn’t enough juice in the system; once the batteries ran down, their humanoid shapes lost structural integrity and, like it or not, they reverted to being Ostar. Which meant they had to be careful, yes, and they had to think ahead and make sure they weren’t caught with their genomes down; but it meant that, until the sun came up and recharged their power reserves, they could find an open space somewhere and run …
They reached the wire at the far end of the forest, stopped and sank down in the brush under a tall, fat oak tree, their sides heaving. “Clears the head,” one of them growled.
“You bet,” the other one replied.
The forest had gone quiet. Not ordinary night-time silence, which isn’t silent at all, but the nervous dead stillness of a large community of small, nocturnal edible things painfully aware that two super-predators are on the loose somewhere in the darkness. What the hell was that? the silence asked, and devoutly hoped it’d never find out.
“Well?”
“Well what?”
“What are we going to do now?”
The other one thought for a moment, savouring the endorphin-induced clarity he could never achieve while dressed up as a tree-swinger. “We tell him?”
“Fine. ‘What?”
Good point. There was a limit to what the primate would be able to take in; too much, and its brain would simply unhinge. “About aposiderium, for a start.”
“All about aposiderium?”
“No, of course not, don’t be stupid. Just about the little bits.” The not-a-werewolf thought for a moment, then added, “I think he’s already figured out some of it for himself.”
“Surely not.”
“Don’t underestimate them,” the other one replied. “They’re definitely smarter than the ones back home.”
“Yes, but—”
“If he wasn’t part of the way there, why did he have those scans done?”
His colleague nodded slowly. “That’s true,” he said. “Amazing, really, what they’re capable of, considering. When we get home, I’d really like to do a comprehensive study.”
“Whatever.” A cloud scudded across the moon. They both shivered. “Meanwhile, we’re agreed, we tell him about the money.
The two definitely-not-werewolves-because-werewolves-don’t-exist, meanwhile, were running through the trees. Really running; it wasn’t something you could do while you were wearing the monkey-suit, because it only had two legs, and the musculature and cardiovascular set-up were rubbish. Really running was something else: a bit like flying, a bit like sex, a bit like having a race against your own body and winning. It had been weeks since they’d had a chance to run properly, and they made the most of it.
“Better?” panted one to the other, when they paused for breath.
“A bit,” the other replied. “Last one to the other end of the forest’s a human.”
They ran again. There was a complex technical reason why they could only do this at certain times. It had to do with where they’d left their ship. In order to hide it from the planet’s rudimentary sensors — telescopes, for crying out loud, and radio signals — they’d parked up in the lee of the absurdly large moon, and that was fine. Even though the moon was more or less in the way most of the time, the ship could still beam them enough power from its capacitor array to enable them to maintain human form. But there came a time, one or two lunar rotations in every thirty or so, when the moon blocked off the planet completely, blanking out the signal. During the daylight hours, it didn’t matter; they’d adapted their transceivers to scrounge enough energy from the sunlight to supplement their reserves of battery power and keep them monkey-shaped. But at night, when the sun went down and the great white moon rose fully round and bright, there simply wasn’t enough juice in the system; once the batteries ran down, their humanoid shapes lost structural integrity and, like it or not, they reverted to being Ostar. Which meant they had to be careful, yes, and they had to think ahead and make sure they weren’t caught with their genomes down; but it meant that, until the sun came up and recharged their power reserves, they could find an open space somewhere and run …
They reached the wire at the far end of the forest, stopped and sank down in the brush under a tall, fat oak tree, their sides heaving. “Clears the head,” one of them growled.
“You bet,” the other one replied.
The forest had gone quiet. Not ordinary night-time silence, which isn’t silent at all, but the nervous dead stillness of a large community of small, nocturnal edible things painfully aware that two super-predators are on the loose somewhere in the darkness. What the hell was that? the silence asked, and devoutly hoped it’d never find out.
“Well?”
“Well what?”
“What are we going to do now?”
The other one thought for a moment, savouring the endorphin-induced clarity he could never achieve while dressed up as a tree-swinger. “We tell him?”
“Fine. ‘What?”
Good point. There was a limit to what the primate would be able to take in; too much, and its brain would simply unhinge. “About aposiderium, for a start.”
“All about aposiderium?”
“No, of course not, don’t be stupid. Just about the little bits.” The not-a-werewolf thought for a moment, then added, “I think he’s already figured out some of it for himself.”
“Surely not.”
“Don’t underestimate them,” the other one replied. “They’re definitely smarter than the ones back home.”
“Yes, but—”
“If he wasn’t part of the way there, why did he have those scans done?”
His colleague nodded slowly. “That’s true,” he said. “Amazing, really, what they’re capable of, considering. When we get home, I’d really like to do a comprehensive study.”
“Whatever.” A cloud scudded across the moon. They both shivered. “Meanwhile, we’re agreed, we tell him about the money.
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