Beastchild

front promenade.
        "The helicopter!" Banalog said.
        But Docanil was by him, running for the door, a huge, dark figure much like something a human might have painted to represent a demon of Hell fleeing the wrath of the Almighty. He burst through the doors and onto the porch, Banalog a few steps behind.
        The copter was lying on its side. It had been rammed by a heavy, ten passenger ground car, toppled from its landing skis. The car circled and came back, running headlong for the front of the plane. It struck with a resounding jar that shook the ground and even sent a tremble through the patio on which they stood. The windscreen shattered. The nose crumpled inward, jamming the control mechanisms.
        Docanil leaped into the snow, covering several yards, landing more lightly than Banalog would have thought possible. He started for the ground car in which Hulann and the human rode.
        The car turned from the demolished copter, struck for the side of the hotel, trying to get behind it and away across the wild top of the mountain.
        The Hunter Docanil turned, trying to cut them off, running faster than was possible in snow so deep.
        Hulann gunned the engine of the car. The tread kicked up chunks of snow and mud, threw them back over the Hunter.
        But it would take a few moments for the car to gain speed, whereas the specially nurtured, specially constructed muscles of the Hunter had ground into high gear in a fraction of a second. It would be a toss-up who would reach the end of the hotel wall soonest.
        Banalog was furious that he could do nothing. But, if he had the power to decide the outcome of the contest, who would he choose? Hulann and the boy? And go against his race. Or side with the Hunter-and be responsible for the other two deaths. Two deaths? A human death was merely an extermination, was it not? His head spun dizzily…
        It was now apparent that, despite his furious pace, Docanil was going to lose the race. The ground car was moving now, leaving him a few more feet behind every moment.
        The Hunter stopped, not even panting for breath, and raised his bare hands.
        The car was at the corner of the hotel.
        Docanil's fingers twitched.
        Around the car, flames sprang up, and the snow burned.
        The fingers twitched again.
        The rear left fender of the car burst like a balloon, the fragments of steel whirling upwards into the snow, ringing down on the patio or falling with soft plops in the whiteness.
        But Hulann kept his foot on the accelerator. The car moved on, around the wall, out of sight.
        The Hunter Docanil ran to the corner and stared after it. Once more, he raised his fingers and tried to destroy it. But it was beyond his range now.
        He watched it for several minutes. Soon, the elements pulled a white veil over it.
        Watching the spot where he had last seen it, he took his gloves from his pockets and slowly pulled them on his freezing hands.
        "What now?" Banalog asked at his side.
        He said nothing.
        The Hunter's Guild perpetuates the original conception of the proper making of a Hunter. While the foetus is still in early stages, steps are made to limit the emotions its brain is capable of. Things like love and sympathy are, naturally, excised! Duty remains. A Hunter must have a sense of duty. Hate is left in too. That always helps. But perhaps, most important of all, a Hunter is permitted to feel humiliation. And when once humiliated, he is relentless. He pursues with a dogged determination that rules out all possibility of escape.
        Docanil the Hunter had just been humiliated for the first time in his life…

Chapter Thirteen
        
        It was three o'clock in the morning when Docanil the Hunter found the abandoned groundcar that Hulann and the human child had used to escape. He would have discovered it sooner (they had only driven it twenty miles before leaving it) but he had been forced to wait for a replacement helicopter to arrive in reply to his Phasersystem summons. Now, when it was the time to sleep and store energies, he was toiling more vigorously than ever. Though naoli preferred to sleep on much the same schedule as humans, they could go as much as five days without rest and still function properly. A Hunter, it was rumored, could perform his duties well for up to two sleepless weeks.
        Banalog, on the other