Chapter VI

Joe Tyler stood next to his friend, James Larry, who had taken the death of Pete Jacobson very hard. Practically half the town was present at the cemetery, all dressed in black. He rested a reassuring hand on the man's shoulder. Larry had grown up with Pete. He and Larry's father had been Army buddies when they both served at nearby Fort Riley. When James's father died, Pete had helped his mother to take care of him.

Joe figured that, despite Pete's craggily, haggard looking appearance, he had made an impact on most of the people of the town. Only a handful of the people there at the funeral knew Pete's true cause of death. It was quite unorthodox to hold information from the town; Tyler and the rest of the police force knew that if Pete's murder had gotten out, then a panic would go through the town. Paranoia and fear would run wild.  No, for the time being, the town would merely think that he had suffered a heart attack and rigor had already set in before he was found.

Tyler hung his head solemnly while the pastor said the normal routine. The sheriff just couldn't imagine who or what had done this. But then again, after some of the things he had seen in the past few days he was ready to believe just about anything. He just needed to find this thing…

*  *  *

Blake Cooper just couldn't figure out what had been killing his cattle. In one week, four of his cows had been killed and cut open. Every one of them had been killed at night. He wasn't going to take it anymore; he was staying up tonight, with his shotgun. He examined the carcass closely, the exact same type of cuts and incisions as the previous ones. He had been doing some research on the Internet. Cattle mutilations, as most called them, were not uncommon through out the American plains and southwest, especially in New Mexico and Arizona. Most of the people who wrote about these cattle mutilations, all of which Blake thought to be nutcases, attributed the unnatural deaths to extra-terrestrial causes. He wasn't the kind to believe in such stupid stuff. If he couldn't see it, hear it, taste it, smell it, or touch it, he didn't believe in it, with the exception of things he had read about such as atoms and molecules and bacteria and such. Something like an alien he'd have to see. Then I'd kill it and sell the body to some rich scientist, he thought to himself.

*  *  *

After the funeral, the Tyler's made a few stops around town. Sandy and Michael headed off to the local movie theater, the Rex, while Joe made a brief appearance at the courtroom to testify the truth about pulling over some idiot who had challenged a ticket because he didn't want to pay. The Clay county courthouse itself was massive for such a small town. It stood around ten stories high, due to the clock tower. The part of the building that was used as the courthouse was really only a few stories. The lawn was well kept and surprisingly green for July. Of course, it had been very hot and humid in June and was continuing, so there was plenty of moisture for the plants to take in. Around the building were several statues, one of a pioneer-like man whose identity was always a mystery to the sheriff because he never stopped and read the plaque. Another statue was on the other side of the tower; this one was of a Native American carrying a long, sharp looking spear. Both statues were dark ebony and seemed a little dusty. It had a stern, grizzled face, which reminded Tyler very much of the Sac and Fox elder that had come out and examined the burial ground. Tyler thought back on the story about the demon hunter from the skies that the elder told him.

It was something like this: Centuries ago, a star fell out of the sky. This star was a carrier for a wicked demon. He killed many brave hunters, and only hunters, and took their heads as trophies. He sometimes left their bodies out, skinless, as if drying them for jerky. It fed on the buffalo, for many were found dead. Many hunting parties went out to kill the beast; they knew they could kill it because it bled. But many of these hunting parties never returned. Their bodies were often found later when the tribe moved on to find buffalo. All who had seen the demon only saw its form, for it was not solid, but almost as clear spring water. For a year, man upon man died, until one day a young warrior decided to take vengeance for his father's death. He left at night with nothing but a hunting spear and food for himself. For a week no sign of the young warrior had been seen and all thought he was dead, but the he came back soon after a large flash and a mushroom shaped cloud. His face was cut and bruised and his spear was covered in green blood. The boy said he had tracked the demon back to its fallen star and attacked. He injured it severely and when the demon touched his gauntlet, a sound that the boy could only think of as a warning started. He ran as fast as he could. When the flash came, a great explosion of fire came and destroyed the creature and its star. The boy's name meant Man of Stone, and since then the tribe has believed it would take another man of stone to kill the demon, should it return.

Suddenly Tyler thought of the strange parallel to his own situation in the legend. Both he and Pete had seen something semi-transparent and they had footprint casts to prove that something had been there. A man had been murdered, his head completely removed from his body. And in the legend, buffalo had been mysteriously killed, but now it was cattle. Tyler suddenly sighed and shook his head, I'm just getting paranoid, I probably didn't see anything more than a bird flying off, he thought to himself. He cleared his mind and headed over to the Rex to wait for his wife and son.

*  *  *

That night, Blake Cooper sat on his tractor, waiting for whoever it was who had been killing his cattle. He had a loaded shotgun in his arms and ammunition in his pocket, just in case. The locusts and other creatures that made noise in the night went on loudly, making it hard to hear anything approaching. His eyes felt heavy, but he knew he couldn't afford to loose any more cows. His bobbed to the side a bit and he took a deep breath and quickly pulled it upright. Blake took his coffee thermos and took several swigs to help wake himself up. After a few minutes his eyes were a bit wider and he readjusted himself so he could get a better view of the cattle. Most of them were asleep, but one or two still walked about. He had his eye on his daughter's favorite bull, Icarus, named for some guy from Greek mythology that Cooper didn't really care about.

CRACK

The disgruntled rancher quickly turned in the direction of the sound. A limb had just broken, seemingly at random. The leaves in the trees moved in an unnatural fashion; which happened to be against the wind. He brought up his shotgun and shined a spotlight in the place where the branch had fallen.

*  *  *

A bright light disrupted the Yautja's thermal vision mode on his helmet. It came from a dormant vehicle that resided near the herd of the quadrupeds that the Yautja enjoyed. The light was emanating from some sort of light beacon that a native biped was using from inside the vehicle. The non-native of the planet took a closer examination of the native biped. He held a projectile weapon, aimed for the Yautja. He moved quickly before a loud bang resonated through the trees and scared away the nearby fauna. He rolled to the side to avoid a leaping, antlered quadruped that was running for its life. He quickly aimed his targeting sensors for the biped in the vehicle and fired his shoulder-mounted plasma cannon. The result of the shot, however, was undesired, for the entire vehicle exploded in a vast array of heat that overloaded the thermal vision the Yautja was using. That's two of them, he thought to himself in his own language.

*  *  *

The phone rang at Tyler's house about ten minutes later. "Yeah," Joe started, "What is it now?"