The carcass was enormous. There was enough meat there for a week if he cut it properly. The hide would be warmer than any sleeping bag. The fangs could pass for weapons.

  "Looks like you are going to be my first donor, buddy."

  He said it almost calmly, though inside he was still shaking from what had just happened. But food could wait. Shelter came first.

  Staying here would be foolish. If creatures like this one lived nearby, he would not last long. And he had no idea if there were any people in this world at all.

  He moved along the slope, looking around, searching for a place where he could hide. About three hundred meters from the tiger’s body he spotted something promising. Fallen trees, thick bushes, and a small open patch that could hold a fire. Good enough for a night camp.

  Fire was the most important thing. Without it the night could become deadly. Predators. Cold. Darkness. And beyond that, the simple comfort of flame. A living fire could keep the mind steady.

  He gathered dry twigs, bark, rotten wood, anything that would burn. Then he piled it together and sat beside it, thinking.

  He had seen this many times. People making fire with sticks. Dry fibers smoking, then suddenly turning into flame. It always looked simple.

  It was not.

  He found a straight stick and stripped the bark. He twisted fibers into a thin cord and made a bow. Then he carved a small hollow in a piece of wood, placed the stick inside it, and started spinning.

  Slow at first.

  Then faster.

  Then faster still.

  His shoulders burned. His hands cramped. Sweat ran down his face and dripped onto the ground. He lost the rhythm, cursed, and started again. He nearly gave up, then forced himself to continue. His breathing grew rough, as if this fire truly meant life or death.

  Then he saw it.

  Smoke.

  Thin and almost invisible.

  Carefully he gathered the hot dust and placed it into a bundle of moss. He blew gently.

  Once.

  Then again.

  A spark.

  A faint crackle.

  Flame.

  Tiny and trembling, like a living thing.

  He froze for a moment. Then he added a twig. Then another. The fire slowly grew, lighting his hands, his face, and the uneven slope behind him.

  He stretched his hands toward the warmth and finally let out a long breath.

  Now he had fire.

  Next came water.

  Drinking straight from the stream was risky. He broke off a wide piece of bark and bent it into a rough bowl, fixing the shape with small sticks. Then he filled it with water and began dropping in stones heated in the fire.

  A few minutes later the water began to boil.

  Water solved.

  Food remained.

  On his way back from the stream he noticed several stones near the bank. He picked one up. It was flat and heavy. With a smaller stone he struck its edge.

  The rock cracked and left a jagged but sharp edge.

  Dan tested it with his thumb.

  It cut.

  Not bad.

  He had seen this in survival shows. If you had no knife, you could make one from stone. Good enough to skin an animal or defend yourself if needed.

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  He walked back to the tiger’s body.

  Huge.

  Still.

  You were hungry. I am hungry too, he thought. The only difference is that you had no choice.

  The thought of eating a predator made his stomach twist. It felt wrong. Almost like breaking a taboo.

  But hunger taught quick lessons. Protein meant strength. Strength meant life.

  He got to work.

  The stone tore at the hide. Blood stuck to his fingers. His muscles ached. He worked in silence, the same way he worked during surgery. Only now there were no gloves and no instruments.

  Precision and calm were the only things that might save him.

  He cut several pieces of meat, careful not to ruin the hide. The skin could be useful later. There was no point removing it now. A fresh hide would smell strongly of blood and attract predators. Besides, he was nearly out of strength.

  Morning would be better. More light. More safety.

  "Would be nice if someone who wrote all those survival guides showed how to do this with bare hands," he muttered. "Thanks for leaving room for improvisation."

  He pushed the meat onto a clean branch and placed it above the heat between two stones. Smoke crawled along the ground and stung his eyes. The meat slowly darkened. Fat dripped into the fire and caused small bursts of flame.

  The smell was heavy and wild. Not unpleasant. Just primitive.

  He turned the branch from time to time so the meat would cook evenly. He remembered what they had taught in the army. Hold meat close to coals, not flames, so the outside does not burn while the inside stays raw.

  Here he had almost no coals. Only living fire. So he kept adjusting the branch, lifting it higher, lowering it again.

  The meat crackled. A bitter smell of fat and smoke filled the air.

  When juice began to show on the surface he tore off a small piece, blew on it, and tasted it.

  Bitter. Tough.

  But edible.

  Protein meant life.

  With each bite it felt as if he was putting himself back together piece by piece.

  "Well, Dan," he murmured. "You just ate a saber toothed tiger. Still think this day went badly?"

  He smiled faintly and leaned back against a tree.

  The sky was growing darker. Night was rising over the forest.

  Cold crept in quickly.

  The shelter would need insulation. The hide could help. Tomorrow he would skin the animal properly, dry the hide, and stretch it near the fire.

  Somewhere far away an animal howled. Long and low.

  Dan opened his eyes and looked into the darkness.

  Then something hit him.

  He stared at the fire and suddenly realized that something was missing.

  Something important.

  Noise.

  There were no helicopters. No distant engines. No searchlights sweeping the forest.

  If that animal had escaped from a laboratory, if it had been an experimental specimen, people would be looking for it.

  They would search day and night. Helicopters. Dogs. Thermal cameras.

  A creature like that would never be abandoned.

  Dan lifted his head and listened.

  Silence.

  Only wind.

  And that distant howl.

  Nothing else.

  No one.

  "They are not looking," he whispered. "Nobody is looking."

  Cold spread through his chest.

  That meant no laboratory. No scientists. No rescue teams.

  His theory about an escaped clone was nothing more than a desperate attempt to grab onto something familiar.

  If that was wrong, then what was left?

  Dan looked again at the body of the beast.

  In the dim light it seemed even larger. Even older.

  Then another thought suddenly cut through the darkness.

  Bright.

  Almost joyful.

  He had discovered an extinct species.

  Dan Pelletier, Canadian military medic, had found a living saber toothed tiger. Not bones. Not fossils. A real one. Well, almost real. Dead now, but that hardly mattered.

  The fact was what mattered.

  They existed.

  They had not gone extinct.

  They had survived somewhere deep in this wild untouched part of the planet.

  He almost laughed out loud.

  What a discovery.

  Scientific journals. Interviews. Awards.

  His name would enter history.

  Dan Pelletier, the man who rewrote the textbook of paleontology.

  The smile slowly faded.

  Too bad the tiger died.

  Dan looked at the carcass and shrugged. Technically he had not killed it. The beast had jumped. It had fallen. It had broken itself on the rocks.

  Dan had nothing to do with it.

  A hunting accident.

  But if there were more of them, if this was not a single animal but a whole population...

  The excitement faded as quickly as it had come.

  If others lived here, they might be nearby.

  That meant the danger was not gone.

  It had only stepped back.

  He stared into the darkness beyond the fire. Dozens of such creatures could be hiding there. Hungry. Strong. Fast.

  And if they smelled the blood. If they followed the scent of roasting meat.

  Dan quickly studied his shelter again. The fire burned bright but it might not be enough. He threw more branches onto the flames and made the fire higher.

  Then he moved deeper under the cover of branches where he could not easily be seen but could still watch the approaches.

  He sat there listening to the sounds of the night and wondering how far from home he really was.

  Not in distance.

  In time.

  If saber toothed tigers had truly disappeared thousands of years ago, then where exactly was he?

  And how had he come here?

  Fragments returned to him. White light. Voices. The feeling of being pulled somewhere.

  But the memory slipped away each time he tried to hold it.

  "No," he told himself quietly. "Not now. First survive. Then figure it out."

  He repeated the words like a mantra.

  Yet deep inside something was already forming. A realization he did not want to face.

  A thought flickered at the very bottom of his mind and he pushed it away immediately.

  What if this is not just another forest.

  What if it is another time.

  Too frightening.

  Too impossible.

  It was easier to believe in an escaped clone. A secret laboratory. A conspiracy of scientists.

  Easier than accepting that he might be alone in a world that had never seen a real human being before.

  He sat by the fire and watched the flames, unaware that his theory about a hidden population was only his mind trying to shield him from a truth too vast to accept all at once.

  Dan Pelletier was very far from the truth on that first night.

  And very close to discovering it.

  Not comfort, but a foothold.

  If you were in his place... what would you do next?