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hollow, bachelor existence. Mitch thought it was a waste not to share your life with those you placed above yourself—a great woman, then great kids. Those who saw such sentiment as a corny, traditional sociocultural cliché Mitch dismissed as cynics, truly believing that love conquered all and that it was a basic human need, like eating or sleeping. Maybe that’s what separates us from animals, he thought.

    From his vantage point high above, his eyes were cemented on the two multicolored forms moving slowly up the trail. Like the hawk’s, his existence generally comprised a series of actions and reactions. When he was hungry he ate, when he was tired he slept. And his waking hours were spent in search of sustenance, of which he required a great deal. But unlike the hawk, he had the power of advanced thought. And unlike the hawk, he could make these two creatures his prey.

    A mile up the trail, with Mitch setting a purposely competitive pace, Jack stopped, winded.
    â€œWhat’s wrong?” Mitch asked as he slowed but didn’t stop. “You toast already?”
    Jack gulped air. “Screw you, I’m fine. I’m just not here to set a record, that’s all.”
    â€œOkay. I’m warmed up and don’t want to stop. I’ll meet you at the Y.”
    â€œYeah, okay,” agreed Jack. “Give me a sec. I’ll be three minutes behind you.”
    â€œI won’t bet on that,” Mitch threw in sarcastically.
    â€œYeah, whatever.”
    As Mitch continued up the trail, Jack was irritated that his partner’s pace was that of a thirtysomething guy with no vices. How can you live like that? Guy’s married to his college sweetheart and has done everything by the book. Jack’s heaving breath made nice little stratus clouds around his upper body. When he felt short of wind like this, he did the one thing his body demanded and his head knew was wrong: reach for a cigarette. He lit up and that first pull of smoke felt like pure oxygen, his distress instantly relieved. He tarried for a few minutes savoring the taste of the Marlboro Light.

    He watched as the small two-legs separated. One continued past him but did not see him sheltered in the trees. The one that stayed behind burned something that issued a smell he did not know. He watched it. The small two-legs were the Keepers of Fire.
    He did not know how they controlled it, but that didn’t matter. They controlled it and let it loose and they had brought misery to him and his own. And he hated them for it.
    The Great Fire had been during the last warm time and he had been moving since. He was drawn here because he felt he was close to the place of the small two-legs. After the Great Fire passed, he resolved to kill every small two-leg that crossed his path. Not for food, but for what they had done. But now there was something new, something he had not known about killing them.
    The first one he had killed only a few suns before surprised him when its fear spilled out in waves. He felt its mind voice as he would a warm breeze on his face or a drink from a clear, cold stream. It was then he realized the small two-legs died in a different way than a bear or deer or salmon, in that their feelings of terror were powerful and their thoughts were more like his own. Though their bodies were tiny and fragile, their mind voices were strong. Destroying them, but only after draining their fear, gave him a feeling that was as strong as anything he had ever known—like fire, like mating.
    And as he moved closer to where they lived, he had found that, even when he was not near them, he could sometimes hear the strange sounds from their heads, those complicated, confused mind voices. He could even feel them when they were far away, sometimes as far as a distant valley. He had never killed anything for any reason other than to fill his belly or protect his tribe, but now vengeance had taken on something unexpected: