Wyatt Holmes twirled his gray, handlebar mustache, as was his habit on those rare occasions when circumstance forced him to ponder instead of act.
Wyatt arched a thick eyebrow before finally speaking. “Are you sure? I thought I was only suffering a nasty cold, or perhaps a touch of fever. At worst, I thought I might have a very minor episode of pneumonia. I didn’t expect anything more.”
The doctor frowned as he continued to stare at the holographic image of Wyatt’s lungs floating in the examination room. “The Spiderstrand sickness has migrated from your bones into your lungs now, Mr. Holmes, but that’s not necessarily a quick death sentence. Men and women have lived for years with the Spiderstrand.”
Wyatt grumbled. “I know the history, and I know it won’t be long before I won’t have the strength to stand on my own feet, not long before I’m trapped in some wheelchair. Mind you, not the way I intended to leave this world.”
“We have procedures and medicines. There’s still a lot we can do to slow the advance of the strands.”
Wyatt’s shoulders slumped. In his seventy-some years, his shoulders rarely slumped. “But I’m an old man, and the Spiderstrand won’t need to work very hard to hollow out my bones.”
The doctor motioned with his hand, and the holograph vanished. “Oh, don’t be so sure. I’ve never had a patient as tough and grizzled as you, Mr. Holmes. The things you’ve seen. The things you’ve survived. The wars. The injuries. The hunts. I think the Spiderstrand might’ve picked any enemy it couldn’t handle when it chose to seep into your blood.”
Wyatt enjoyed the doctor’s respect, but he suspected the upcoming expedition would be his final adventure into the savanna, his last opportunity to look upon the new creatures the geneticists were introducing into the grasses. The doctor would tell him it was impossible, but Wyatt could feel the Spiderstand nibbling at the marrow in his bones, feel the Spiderstrand weaving its webs within his lungs. Wyatt believed the experience of so many expeditions to the savanna trained his senses to be as acute as those of any medical, scanning machine. The doctor was very correct. Wyatt Holmes knew much about survival, but that kind of knowledge made one just as familiar with death.
Wyatt realized nothing lived forever. Many diseases flourished as humanity’s old world writhed upon its deathbed, and those illnesses would continue to magnify no matter how hard humanity labored to heal the land. Too much had been lost. The momentum into the decline gained such speed that it couldn’t be turned back. Wyatt supposed he should’ve felt fortunate to live as long as he had before contracting the Spiderstrand. It was very rare for a man to live long enough for one’s mustache to gray, or for the skin on his hands to wrinkle.
“Do I have your permission to go on the expedition?”
The doctor chuckled at Wyatt’s question. “Are you seriously asking that?”
Wyatt was required to receive a physical examination before embarking on every hunting expedition, though that exam was an empty ceremony in his case, for no one would deny Wyatt Holmes a post on any journey into the new wild. Wyatt Holmes was among the rare few who actually possessed the strength needed to kill on the grasslands. Spiderstrand might’ve eaten at his bones, but no one would deny Mr. Holmes a position in the hunting party because of it.
“I doubt I’d be able to run very far if a hammer rhino got on my trail.”
“Mr. Holmes, I wouldn’t deny you the pleasure of the hunt if you couldn’t get yourself out of bed. I’ve a feeling you remain the best rifleman alive, and all that sun and warmth will help your bones. I don’t think I have any medicine to give you that’s any better than the savanna.”
“You have anything more for my joint pain, or for the way my hands tremble?”
“Not if you want to be able to stand on your feet during the hunt.”
That answered troubled Wyatt. The Spiderstrand damaged the nerves as it gnawed on his bones, and Wyatt found it increasingly difficult to steady his hands, a very unfortunate ailment for a hunter to possess, especially for a hunter like Wyatt Holmes, who shouldered so much responsibility each time he travelled to the savanna. His son Cayden would accompany Wyatt on the coming expedition, and the old hunter hoped the young man would prove himself to be among the few who possessed the mettle it took to claim one of the savanna’s incredible creatures as a trophy. Wyatt hoped Cayden might relieve a little of that pressure that settled upon his shoulders. It would be good if his boy could kill, in case Wyatt awoke one morning on that journey and discovered he could no longer wrap his hands around a weapon, or find that he couldn’t catch a breath for the way the Spiderstrand filled his lungs.
He worried that he shouldn’t accompany the expedition at all. Wyatt realized an aging hunter, with a body filling with sickness, could be a dangerous thing for the men, women and mudders accompanying the elderly hunter. Had he not done his share to help establish the new wild? Had he not done his duty to help calm the growling stomachs of the clones? Wyatt knew it wasn’t responsibility alone that urged him to attend another expedition. He loved the smells of the savanna, the feel of the grasses swaying against his skin as the wind rolled over the landscape. And he loved listening to the mudders’ songs, loved listening to those clones sing as they tended to their labors.
The doctor waved a penlight into his patient’s eyes. “May I offer a suggestion?”
“You can give it, but I can’t promise I’ll follow it.”
“Ride in one of the palanquins, Wyatt. Let the mudders carry you over their shoulders. They would love the honor of carrying their beloved hunter over the grass. You deserve that comfort more than anyone.”
“I won’t do that. I always walk with the guides.”
“Even if your knees hurt so badly with every step? Even though you’re going to lose your breath after walking all those miles?”
“I won’t ride on the backs of those mudders.”
The doctor shook his head. “I don’t doubt your word, but I don’t understand it, either.”
Wyatt feared few remained among his kind who might. He was an old man, a product of a dead age. And Wyatt Holmes was one of those increasingly rare few who still owned the will to pull a trigger and do what needed to be done, to do what every expedition was assembled to achieve. The hunting was the only purpose remaining to him, and he hoped Cayden would realize it was the only purpose remaining to human kind.
He feared for the mudders if his son did not. He loved the clones too much to think they might go hungry after he could no longer hunt.