I could go on to the house.
I picked the nearest window and it was the right one. Arden and the rest were in there, moving around, changing clothes, packing, and talking. They were talking about Mars, and how badly they wanted to go back there. They seemed a little sorry about the people they wouldn't be seeing any more, and Arden mentioned me.
But that was all I got to hear. There was a rustle in the bushes and I whirled to see the tawny coming at me, with the iron bar still sticking through it and the puncture sealed by something like scar tissue.
The tawny had its voice back and was howling like a ten-ton tea-kettle. I heard some yells inside the house. Then the beast was on me and I felt the choppers starting. I don't suppose many people these days are familiar with the sensation of being chopped up fine. It isn't pleasant. But it didn't last long. I passed out.
Now this is corny, but when I woke up I figured I had arrived wherever it is you arrive when you get through dying. But then I saw Renn Kettering. I didn't think he'd arrive at the same place I would; at least not the same suburb. Unless, of course, he was running the place. So maybe I hadn't died at that.
I saw I was in some kind of room, in bed, and Renn was standing on the bed. I pinched myself. I was real.
"Welcome to Mars," said Renn.
I sat up. I was in a hut made of little stones, reeds and holes. I glimpsed bits of a green sand desert, pink sky and yellow clouds.
"The tawny tore you up," said Renn, which was no news to me.