"I'm not sick, I'm just having a baby. I still want to capture that runner," DG said as they sat around a stone pot which contained a small campfire.
"Ok, but we are not using you as bait anymore," Glitch informed her. "I said I'd protect you and now there's two of you." He could be very authoritative when he wasn't thinking about it, and she grudgingly admired that in him, even if he could be a little too cautious at times. DG's plan had been that she would have a rope harness fitted and be lowered onto the forest floor by Glitch and Raw. Then when the runner came for her they would pull her up at the last moment and use a lasso to catch it. "I'll go," said Glitch.
"Fair enough," conceded DG. Raw nodded in approval.
-/-/-/-/-
"Ready, Glitch?"
Glitch was trussed up in a harness made from rope. One of the higher branches formed a makeshift pulley, which he now dangled from by another rope. He clenched his fists resolutely.
"Glitch?"
"Yeah, I'm ready," he answered in a slightly tremulous voice.
"Glitch just need courage," Raw reminded him, patting his shoulder, and they slowly began to lower him down. He felt his feet touch the floor and gazed huntedly around, keeping his nostrils wide open. There seemed to be a mobat in his chest, and his face was tingling. Nothing happened. Nothing carried on happening. After nothing had continued to happen for forty-five minutes he began to get fidgety. The harness was digging into his thighs and waist. "Hey, how long do I have to stay down here for?"
"Until a runner comes!" DG called down to him.
"And how long will that be?"
"Hard to tell," Raw answered.
"Try and keep quiet!" added DG, "If you yell too much it'll think you're a rival predator!"
"Oh grapes," Glitch cursed softly. Another hour passed and he was definitely getting uncomfortable when…
CHACKACHACKACHACKACHACKA…
"Aaargh! It's here!" Glitch shrieked to the heavens, "Don't let it touch my noggin!" Just as it was rearing its head to take a juicy chunk out of him, he was whisked up into the air like some kind of weird, backwards roller-coaster ride, and the lasso came down in his place. There was a roar and a retreating chackachacka, which faded into nothing.
"Darn it – missed!"
"I am not going down there again – my skin's rubbed to the bone!" exaggerated Glitch, loosening the harness, disentangling himself and rubbing the creases at the top of each leg where the rope had cut in.
"We'll give it a rest and try again after lunch," said DG. Glitch sighed. He wouldn't ever put Raw through more trauma with a carnivorous runner, given the situation he had been in when they first met. But if he didn't play bait again then DG would. There was no way out. "C'mon," DG added, and they made their way to Raw's hut for a lunch of fruit, honey, chestnuts and pigeon.
-/-/-/-/-/-
Luckily the first encounter with the runner had not been entirely a waste of time, because it came back for another try. It wasn't so bad for Glitch either – they padded the harness stop it rubbing, and he now trusted DG and Raw to pull him up in time, even if it meant missing their quarry. Of course, he'd trusted them all along, but…well…it had been the first attempt and there had been no telling how it would go.
This time the runner came within minutes, and it wasn't frightening being hoisted upwards either. "I got him!" DG shrieked, and sure enough, the runner was trapped, straining and dashing round in hopeless circles on the end of the lasso. "Poor thing," DG marvelled, gazing down.
"Yeah don't forget he almost killed us," Glitch reminded her.
"Fetch fruit?" Raw suggested, and DG nodded. He disappeared, and DG and Glitch gazed over the walkway to the creature below, which had now stopped trying to run. It was panting and attempting, and failing, to remove the lasso.
"He won't let us near him. Not in a million years," Glitch ran a finger along his zipper in thought.
"How can you tell it's a he?"
He gestured to the teeth. "Spikey. The females have rounded tips."
"Let's call him Spikey then."
"Ok." Glitch looked sideways at her. "How long will this take?"
She shrugged. "It's never been done before…But now he's stopped running," she continued as Glitch opened his mouth and drew breath, "I'd say…three or four days to get near. Then maybe a week to teach him to walk with us."
"That's workable."
Raw returned with a basket of pears. "This do?"
"Perfect!" DG picked up a stick with a rope attached, rather like a primitive fishing rod. Then she tied a pear to the string. "Lower me down," she said, adding quickly, seeing Glitch start to protest: "Not low enough for him to reach, just so he can see me".
The runner gazed up at the squishy-looking, wriggling, humanoid piece of meat hanging just out of its reach. How frustrating! He reared his head up as far as it would go, but those legs still kicked annoyingly above him. Then a very odd thing happened. A juicy, golden pear seemed to float down from the sky. The runner sniffed it appreciatively. This was far superior to anything he had come across in the wild. It seemed ready to eat, and smelled mouth-wateringly sweet. Was it too good to be true? No, it seemed to be ok. He nibbled. Very tasty. In less than three seconds the pear was snaffled.
Above him, DG punched the air and motioned for another one.
-/-/-/-/-
"How much food does one of them need a day?" DG asked Raw.
"It eat man in two days. Maybe twelve pears."
"So we can train with four each morning, afternoon and evening?"
"Possible."
DG grinned, energised by purpose. "Then we can take him home in a few weeks!"
