D.F. Huettner hails from the small town of Biglerville, Pennsylvania in the US. His writing can be found on the world wide web in Planet Magazine (June 2000) and Nuketown (Dec. 2000). Two of his novellas are for sale at Lowe Publishing's website, www.4goodbooks.com . While waiting for a lucrative print deal, D.F. Huettner is content to be a cyberwriter. He sees the internet as the way of the future, and is glad to be there on the ground floor.

The morning's search had proven fruitless. By noontime, Stam's eye was burning from the refection of the sun on the desert sand. Finally, exhausted, she turned to go back to the city when something caught her eye. Perhaps a hundred yards away, behind a sparse grove of halucenocacti, on a conical pile of blanderstones, sat a Torgad. The sight of his spherical, gray-coated body sent a shiver through Stam, and she glided forward to claim her prize.

The distance to him seemed endless. Gliding was easy on smooth city floors, but out here in the sand, it was an arduous, tiresome task, especially since the halucenocacti blocked the path. Yet keeping her eye on the Torgad, Stam joyfully endured the pain.
She slowed as she reached the site of the blanderstone hill, unnecessarily being quiet. She knew that the Torgad could not hear her. In his comatose state, he could hear no sound but the mating call, the one Stam's grandmother had taught her mother, and the one her mother had taught her. His mind was locked in cyclical catatonic thought, and only that one thing would bring him to life.
Stam took a while to admire her catch. He was perched on a pedestal of carefully piled blanderstones, their gray flecked appearance practically blending with the coloring of his wooly fur coat. His spherical body appealed to Stam. He was slightly larger than she.
The Torgad's vestigial arm hanging limp at his side made Stam wander in her thoughts for a moment. She remembered reading in the library of Stella Kowalski's feeling her husband's broad shoulders and hugging his neck. But those people had lived millions of years in the past. Now she sat facing evolved Man, the Torgad, a ball of gray fur, one giant eye pointed straight up, and a dead, withered arm, dangling clumsily at his side. Even at that, Stam felt the ancient urge to marry and mate, perhaps more strongly than Stella Kowalski.
She began gliding up to the blanderstone hill when a sharp voice startled her into turning.
"That's my Torgad!" It was a Vontorgad, like Stam, but much older. This one was past her prime. Her gray hair had lost most of its sheen. Her shoulder had begun to droop. She was ugly in her aging state.
"But I was here first," Stam protested.
"I saw him first," the other shot back, "from that hill." She jerked her shoulder and her arm flailed in the general direction of a low rise of ground to the south.
"Well, I got here first, and I claim him," Stam replied.
"I don't care. It doesn't matter if you were here first. I've been searching all day," the other said.
"I came out at four," Stam said calmly.
"He's mine!" cried the ugly one.
Stam was rather peeved that this old relic was claiming her virile Torgad. She wanted to settle the argument, take her Torgad, and leave. "Listen," she said, "I started looking at four o'clock this morning, therefore I've been looking longer. I deserve him."
"No! You little hussy! Why should you get him? I deserve him! I've been searching for years to find the right Torgad. My first one was stolen by a little hussy just like you!"
"Your first Torgad?" Stam cried. "You mean you've already owned one? And you've already mated?"
"Yes, and he was no good," came the reply.
"Then you have no right to keep this one from me! You've already owned one!" Stam said.
"I don't care. This one's mine too," the Vontorgad said, gliding toward the blanderstone hill to give the mating call.
"Wait a minute!" Stam said, gliding between the advancing Vontorgad and the blanderstone hill. "I can't just let you take him. It wouldn't be right. How about we say it together and let him decide?" This she saw as a victory because of her good looks.
"He's mine, I tell you!" cried the Vontorgad, jerking suddenly.
Stam was slapped hard by the withered arm of her rival. She hadn't wanted to resort to violence, but it was all that was left to do. Swinging around, Stam landed a good shot with her own arm. Then another swat hit her side.
Although Stam was younger and more agile, this older Vontorgad had experience on her side. Stam figured she had fought many times for a Torgad. The bitch was pushing her around!
Stam rolled her eye up over her to see where she was headed, and luckily too, for the Vontorgad was trying to maneuver her into the halucenocacti. To be speared by the spines of the halucenocactus brought dream-ridden sleep. Stam had no desire to awaken to the sight of an empty blanderstone hill.
Suddenly she saw an arm flying at her. She squashed herself, ducking, to avoid the terrible blow.
"Ah! Damn you! Damn you!" screeched the Vontorgad. Her arm was impaled on cactus spines. Stam rolled her eye up and over her to see two of the hollow spines drain their milky fluid into the Vontorgad's arm.
The oldster pulled her arm free and collapsed on the red sand. Her eye slid shut.
Stam regained her senses. The fight was over, and the Torgad remained, not having heard or seen any of the tussle.
Slowly Stam glided over to the blanderstone hill and rested for a moment at its base. Then carefully, eloquently, she whispered the mating call into the wind.
"Yes."