The Camp Site

She spotted the stranger well before he spotted her. Crouching in the low brush, she can see the man looks tired and thirsty as he lumbers across the plain, his face drooping with anguish, greasy with sweat. The dusty yellow earth makes it harder to breathe here. A bulky bag is slung over his back, and whatever is inside weighs him down.

She follows him, assessing how much danger he poses. He is alone, that much she is sure of, but still, it is unwise to rush in these situations. So, she sticks to the scrub, silently moving between the ground coverings, watching. Waiting.

The sun is high overhead, but she is unbothered. It has been two sunrises since she found his discarded bandana, thick with his scent. Whether it has been discarded on purpose or by mishap, she cannot know, but it tells her much. Crusty with dried sweat and dirty phlegm, she discerns the stranger is dehydrated. Finding him, she sees his condition has deteriorated and now he is desperate, the need for water the only force driving him onward.

Finally, she decides to make her presence known. Bounding silently on all four of her padded paws, it doesn’t take her long to overcome him – he is going at a slow, maladroit pace. Drawing a long steadying breath, she hops out in front of him, just close enough that she can escape if he decides to attack her. She is almost certain he won’t.

Feigning disinterest, she doesn’t look straight at him, instead sniffing at the ground in front of her as if it contains something of great interest. She hears him stop abruptly, drawing in a sharp breath. Continuing to ignore him, she makes a show of examining everything but the pioneer. For that is what he is: a human sent forth to explore her home, to see what might be reaped from it.

Belatedly making eye contact with him, her whiskers twitch as she watches the man appraise her. She is small in stature, barely the size of his palm, and it is evident he believes her to be of no threat to his person. Turning from him and without a sound, she begins to trot away. All her movements are purposeful, hoping he will follow her. She knows where the water is and wants the stranger to surmise she is going somewhere important. Without turning her head, she senses when he begins to run behind her, his feet shuffling along noisily, kicking up the dirt.

The man is slow. He only keeps pace behind her for less than a hundred meters before he halts, gasping and coughing.

Then he speaks. “Sorry, I’m not a young man anymore. And this dust feels like it’s caked every corner of my lungs.”

She is surprised he is talking to her.

Her pace is too arduous for the man. So, she pauses, letting him catch his breath. Once the stranger has recovered, she begins again, this time at a more leisurely measure. This pleases him, and he resumes his croaky chattering.

“I really hope you’re leading me to water.” She doesn’t respond. Better he thinks of her as inane and unthreatening.

When she hears him begin to wheeze, she again pauses their progress. He drags his forearm across his face, flicking the sweat from his eyes. It crosses her mind that he must be missing his foul bandana. He is racked with another coughing fit and spits a glob of brown from his mouth onto the dust. She is mildly disgusted. This place is not for him.

She hears the stream long before he does, her long ears allowing her to catch the noise better than him. His steps pick up when he detects the burbling water, and she quickens her pace accordingly. Because he is much taller than her, he sees the stream first and lopes past her, falling to his knees on the edge of the bank. Rather than dunking his head into the flowing liquid, he swings the bag from his back and begins to pull various objects out of it. Using a small clear tube, he dips it in the stream until it is full. Carefully, he sprinkles droplets on some sort of device.

All of this is confusing to her. While he waits for something, he looks hard at her, as if realizing for the first time that she might possess more than basic animal instincts.

Wanting him to trust her, she dips her mouth to the water and drinks, small quick sips.

He relaxes, reassured of her innocence. A loud beep sounds from his wrist, stinging her sensitive ears. Looking at it, relief and joy bloom across his face. Without further hesitation, he plunges his head into the stream, gulping greedily. Once he has his fill of the refreshment, he collapses face up onto the bank. She is pleased.

“Never thought I’d be saved by an alien mouse,” he says breathlessly.

This is not the first time she has been miscategorized by humans, but she pays his ignorance no mind. She begins to clean her dense feathers, licking her paws and dragging them over her ears and face. And while this may appear as a rescue mission, it is not.

Of course, she says nothing to the man, who in his water-induced delirium is jabbering to himself.

“This is great news. Great news. Potable water. Earth has a chance.”

She switches to grooming her silky tail, waiting. It won’t be long now. She is just one small entity, the unassuming lure.

An odor fills her nose, alerting her to the arrival of the predator. The pioneer has no chance of detecting the smell, his olfactory system far too weak. Oblivious to his surroundings, he is filling a large bladder with the precious water, readying himself to return to his vessel. 

He never sees the large, reptilian-like being coming until it is too late.

She sits, watching until his screams stop.