Tau Ceti (an Ell Donsaii story #6) by Laurence Dahners

continuing to walk out into the middle of the clearing. Once Goldy had achieved level flight Emma began watching the nose camera of the rocket which faced the direction they were traveling. Occasionally her gaze flickered to the camera that had been facing forward as Goldy walked and which now faced down at the ground. Emma didn’t see the cause of Goldy’s dive until the last moment when she saw the small animal diving into its burrow.
    Emma sent out an email message to the group, “Check attached video, Goldy hunting from air.” Shortly she sent out another email, “Check attached video, Goldy building a snare!”
    Emma’s eyes widened as she realized that Silver had built a fire, then to her bemusement Goldy detached the rocket from her chest and leaned it up against a small tree. One side ’s camera showed the tree ’s bark , as did the nose camera. The side camera opposite the tree showed mostly sky. One camera faced up the mountain. The last camera showed a small cleared area with the fire burning on one side of the image . Some lumpy things like ugly potatoes hung over the fire on sticks. But nothing was happening in the view. Emma considered extending the legs and using the attitude jets to set the camera back up and turn it around to get a better view. But she worried that if it frightened Goldy and Silver away it would be a tremendous loss. Emma settled in to do some reading while waiting for something else to happen.
    Quite a while passed, then a brown object landed in the cle ared area in front of the fire. T herefore it lay in the view of the camera facing that way and Emma narrowed her eyes examining it . It wasn’t in the center of the picture but pretty close. Emma had zoomed all the way out to try to see something interesting at the periphery of the picture. Now she zoomed in on what appeared to be a small dead animal. She was pretty sure that it was either the animal that Goldy had stooped on earlier or a similar animal. Since it had escaped into a hole in the ground Emma thought it must be a burrowing animal like a rabbit. It appeared to have eight limbs. Four smaller ones that came off one side and four larger ones that came off the other side and reached around to the same side as the small legs . Goldy stepped into the picture and pushed it with a foot so it rolled, then stepped away. Suddenly it made sense. The four smaller legs were on the bottom now. The bigger legs came off the top of the animal, reminding her of a spider ’ s legs. The big legs were long enough to reach the ground on the bottom side as well. The big legs, like those of the large animal in the forest had something like claws on them . The modified claws looked like they could also be used for something else, though Emma wasn’t sure what.
    Goldy reappeared, pulled out its knife , crouched and began cutting the burrower up . The skin peeled off with a few quick strokes of the knife , pulling up over the head like a shirt. The skin and the head were then chopped off . Then instead of making a longitudinal slice into a body cavity like Emma had seen her Dad do on fish, Goldy cut the neck off the body then cut transversely through the burrower just behind the front limbs. Goldy seemed to pause to break something bony at the back and the front before cutting the rest of the way around to separate the burrower into a front and back half. The n Goldy cut through the body expos ing a cavity that she quickly pulled organ and intestine looking things out of, casting most of them aside but keeping a few solid looking chunks. The limbs were twisted and cut loose. All the pieces were spitted on a stick and hung over the fire.
    Emma had her AI send another email, “Check attached video , caught a burrower, cut it up. Cooking it!!”
     
    ***
     
    Darkness had fallen by the time Dex and Syrdian tore into the burrower and tuber. It tasted great! Dex wondered if it was due to the old saying about how everything tast ed bette r if you’d