Insects there were: a regular cacophony of buzzings, chirpings and monotonous mutterings. By the time I'd reached the bank of the stream, I'd lost track of individual varieties.
The stream was a bare trickle; the bed was spongy and dotted with tall, spare plants that resembled horse tails; I negotiated the fifty feet to the opposite bank without difficulty.
I threaded through a thicket and came out into a brief expanse of savannah.
There I found the first evidence of the fate of 231's people.
It was a small object, oval, flattened, the color of old ivory.
Although I hadn't been walking along with my head under my arm, it took me a moment to tumble to what I'd discovered.
Then my hair tried to stand on end. I rid myself of it and used the minicomm for the first time.
Speaking to a recorder was altogether too impersonal for what I had to report.
"I've just found a patella; a human knee-cap. I'm about a hundred feet beyond the far bank of the stream in almost a straight line from the camp. I'm in grass about two feet tall. I'm casting about now, looking—Hold it. Yes, it's scraps of a gray uniform. More remains. Here's a femur; here's a radius-ulna. The bones are clean, scattered. Evidence of scavengers. No chance for a P-M on this one."
I got out the chart from its case on the suit's belt, x'd the location, and went on, feeling more lonely all the time.