Free To Reign in Hell: The Exile of Khan Noonien Singh by Greg Cox Page A

body indeed?
    “Khan, look!”
    Marla pointed toward the west, where a flock of the giant condors was even now descending on some unseen piece of carrion, which appeared to be sheltered beneath a thicket of shrubs and palm saplings approximately one-point-five kilometers away.
Something
was clearly attracting the scavengers: possibly the beast, its two missing victims, or both.
    “An excellent observation,” Khan declared, turning to address the entire search party. “We shall investigate at once.”
    “As you command,” Ericsson said with questionable sincerity.
    Joaquin led the way, hacking his way through the heavy brush with a three-hundred-year-old machete. It was hardgoing, especially with the sun blazing high overhead, and Khan’s red coverall was soon soaked with sweat. There was no question of stopping to rest, however, not while the fate of the wounded carnivore remained unclear. Khan held on tightly to the grip of his phaser, just in case the daylight held its own dangers.
    A faint lowing noise caught his attention, and he glanced toward the horizon in time to see a herd of immense, bison-like creatures grazing upon a rolling stretch of savanna.
The natural prey of last night’s intruders?
Khan speculated.
And perhaps suitable game for my people as well
.
    The party paused briefly to watch the distant herbivores. “It is curious,” Khan remarked to Marla, who appeared grateful for a short respite. “For an alien world, the flora and fauna here seem strangely familiar. Condors, bison, palm trees, great cats of some variety … I would have expected extraterrestrial life-forms to be more exotic.”
    “This sort of parallel evolution is surprisingly common throughout the known galaxy,” Marla informed him. Perspiration bathed her lovely features. “You met Mr. Spock, for example. His people, the Vulcans, are remarkably human in appearance, despite having evolved on a different planet in a distant solar system.”
    Her chestnut eyes took in the wild landscape. “From the look of things, I’d guess that the biology of Ceti Alpha V is equivalent to Earth’s own Pleistocene Epoch, complete with a tendency toward gigantism in the larger vertebrates.” She glanced upward, where another enormous condor could be seen soaring through the sky. Khan estimated the bird’s wingspan to be nearly six meters across. “Of course,” Marla added, “it’s too early to be certain of anything.”
    “Spoken like a historian,” Khan said with a smile. Marla’s theory appealed to him; better to conquer a world of giants than a planet of pygmies. Prehistoric man had survived and prospered during the Pleistocene. He and his people, supremely gifted as they were, were sure to do even better. “Come,” he instructed the others, impatient to get back to the business of empire-building. “Let us complete our trek.”
    Arriving at last at the verdant thicket, they were rewarded with the sight of a large, tawny form stretched out beneath the meager shade of a few palms and sycamores. The hindquarters of the motionless beast were lost beneath the underbrush, but the creature’s feline head and forelimbs were clearly visible. Khan’s wide-eyed gaze was instantly drawn to a pair of huge ivory tusks jutting from the great cat’s upper jaw.
    “A sabertooth!” he gasped out loud.
    “
Smilodon fatalis,
” Marla confirmed, her hypothesis looking better and better. “Such as prowled the Earth over one million years ago. During the Pleistocene, to be exact.”
    The beast was at least a meter long, possibly more, while Khan guessed that the massive carcass had to weigh at least two hundred kilograms. Its huge, serrated canines were the size of daggers and its titanic front legs looked strong enough to bring down an ox, let alone a healthy human being. Brown and golden stripes streaked its shaggy pelt, the better to prowl unseen through the high summer grass.
    A scorch mark on the creature’s right side made it clear that was