A glance upward showed that the other patrolling mokusinga were no longer hovering threateningly overhead. Hesitantly Hasa rose upward. As soon as he broke the surface he spit out something small, green, and confused. While it raced speedily away, relieved to be free of the prison of his mouth, he sucked in a long, delicious draught of warm rain and fresh air. The mokusinga were still there, but they were no longer airborne. Except for the one that had landed in the water in front of him, they were all lying on the punky logs of the jam, deflating slowly, their ominous humming stilled.
Jemunu-jah was climbing out of the water. Cautiously he drew near a pair of the stranded needle throwers. They showed no reaction to his approach. Hasa noted that the Sakuntala was careful not to make physical contact with the quiescent creatures.
“I think they dead,” Jemunu-jah announced in amazement. “It safe to come out.”
Hasa joined him in studying the unmoving predators. Coughing and snapping water away from his trunks, Masurathoo was slow to emerge from the turgid water’s protective embrace.
The bioprospector leaned as close to one of the motionless organisms as he dared. There were no visible wounds on any of the bodies, no signs of injury. Yet they were not sleeping, had not suddenly opted for instant estivation as opposed to trying to kill the three people they had chased into the water. They were manifestly deceased.
“I don’t get it,” he muttered. “I can see maybe one of them just dropping dead. But six? Simultaneously?”