I’ve been back for a couple of weeks now. I finally got a decent night’s sleep night before last. I sat down 3 days ago with my waterlogged rough sketch and tried to remember clearly. I wasted a lot of paper. But below is what I think I saw.
Some of this is undoubtedly off. This creature’s anatomy is just alien enough that some of it will require more extensive observation to figure out.
Things to note:
The creature is what we might call centauroid. It’s got 8 limbs, obviously, with two distinct types or roles. The hands were hard to recall clearly. In my mind there was something very strange about them, but I cannot recall what it was. The “face” is nearly featureless except for the eye-like orb that dominates it. The eye itself looked like glass and had no features we would normally associate with that organ (pupil, iris, etc). The protuberances on the sides of the head were stiff, maybe even boney. It had no mouth on the face, but there was an opening an opening on the upper torso that may have filled that role. I saw nothing resembling a nose. The lower body was thick and heavy looking, more like a rhinoceros than a horse. My earlier thought of an elasmotherium was closer than I could have imagined. The whole thing looked hairless. No tail that I could see.
It was, to my eye, unornamented and unclothed. Its behavior, as described before, was not what I would call that of a simple animal. It felt like it was observing me. I have no idea what I did that provoked its reaction before I fled. I don’t think I moved that fast, nor did I brandish anything, much less something that could be considered a weapon.
At some point I will have to go back there and look for it.
Not ready for that.