Xander brought the notebook with him.
He'd been carrying it since the lift. It was in his coat pocket, folded shut, the last page still holding the word he hadn't finished. He hadn't added anything to it. He hadn't needed to. The lift was still sticking, and the operator was still filing the same complaint, and nothing had changed except the fact that Xander now had a word for what he didn't understand.
He didn't take it out. He just knew it was there.
The assignment was on the west gate board when they arrived. Boundary inspection — the outer fence line, the western service road, the old survey markers between them.
No proctor.
The hoist house had been inside the campus. Anyone walking past could have seen them. This route went past the orchard, past the last of the mapped grounds, up toward the ridge line where the fence posts were weathered and some of them were leaning. Nobody would see them out there.
Drake read the notice twice, then handed it to Xander.
"First one that actually leaves," he said.
"I know."
Kara looked at the empty path where Halden usually stood. "He's really not coming."
"No."
She was quiet for a moment. Then she pulled her sleeves down over her hands and started walking.
---
The western service road ran along the edge of the mapped grounds, past the old orchard and up toward the ridge. It was quiet. Fewer students came this way. The trees on the north side were older, and the fence line on the south side had been patched in places and left alone in others.
Drake checked the posts as they walked. Xander read the fence line — where it had been repaired, where it hadn't, which sections had shifted since the last marking. Luna walked along the tree line with her eyes on the ground. Kara stayed on the road. James moved wherever a gap opened.
They were a mile out when Luna stopped.
"There's something in the trees."
They all stopped.
Drake turned toward the tree line. "What kind?"
"I don't know yet. Something big."
---
It came out slowly.
About the size of a small horse. Low to the ground. Broad across the shoulders. Dark grey hide, ridged along the spine, with plates worn smooth by weather. Its head was low, scenting the ground.
It saw them.
It stopped.
Nobody moved.
"That's a ridge-hound," Xander said.
"I've never seen one," Kara said.
"Neither have I."
Luna was watching it. "It's not hunting. It's just standing there."
Drake didn't take his eyes off it. "What's a ridge-hound doing here?"
"They live up on the western ridge," Xander said. "High ground. Cold. They don't come down past the tree line."
"Ever?"
"Not that I've read."
The ridge-hound shifted its weight. It wasn't looking at them the way a predator looks at prey. It was looking at them the way a territorial animal looks at something in its space.
The ridge-hound shifted its weight. Slow. Deliberate. Not the way a predator moves.
Luna watched it. "It's not hungry."
"No," James said. "It's not."
---
They stood there for a long minute.
The ridge-hound didn't advance. It didn't retreat either. It held its ground and watched them.
"What do we do?" Kara asked.
"Assignment said inspect the fence line and the survey markers," Drake said. "It didn't say what to do about this."
"We could drive it off," Kara said.
"Or we could not," Luna said.
Drake looked at the ridge-hound. Then at the road. Then at the campus behind them.
"If we push it," he said, "it might run toward the orchard. That's closer to the campus."
"If we leave it alone," Xander said, "it might settle here. Then it's a problem for the next rotation."
"If we kill it," Kara said, "it stops being a problem."
Nobody answered.
The ridge-hound watched them.
---
James walked forward.
Three steps. Then stop. The ridge-hound's head came up. It watched him.
He looked at it. Not the way Luna looked at living things, not the way Xander looked at a system. He looked at the ground under its feet, and the trees behind it, and the slope of the land between them.
"It came down the ridge," he said. "There's a deer trail behind it. It's been walking a while."
"How can you tell?" Drake asked.
"The plates on its back. They've got dirt on them. Dry dirt. That's not from up there."
Nobody said anything for a moment.
"So it's lost," Kara said.
"Or it left," James said.
He walked back to them.
"We mark it and report it," he said. "We don't engage. We finish the route on the other side of the road. If it moves toward the campus, we come back and deal with it. If it doesn't, it's not our problem."
Drake looked at him. Then at the ridge-hound. Then back at the road.
"Alright," he said.
---
They walked the rest of the route on the far side of the service road, keeping the tree line in view. The ridge-hound stayed where it was. When they turned back at the far marker, it was gone.
Drake noted the location on his slate. Xander wrote down the species and the estimated size. Luna added the direction it had come from.
Nobody wrote anything about why it was there. There wasn't anything to write.
---
Halden wasn't at the gate when they returned, but there was a clerk at the administrative desk who took their report. He read it. Frowned. Read it again.
"A ridge-hound," he said.
"Yes."
"Down here."
"Yes."
He looked at Drake. "They don't come down here."
"I know."
The clerk made a note on the report. "I'll pass it to the grounds office. They handle wildlife."
"Thank you."
He filed it. Squad 7 left.
---
The report went into the pile with the others. Grounds office would check the ridge trail when someone had time. If the ridge-hound was still in the area, they'd drive it back up. If it wasn't, the report would sit.
It was a known species in an unusual place. That was all.
The clerk didn't think about it again.