Everyone watched, dumbstruck in horror, as Yolanda plummeted twenty feet off the platform into the tank. After a few seconds, she emerged, unharmed by the fall and grabbed on to the tank's edges. She groggily looked around, before giving a sudden yelp of pain, as a Brontoscorpio grabbed her ankle in a vice-like grip and began to pull her into the tank. The struggle lasted for several minutes. However the arachnid's pull was irresistible against her weak grip and it won out, forcibly pulling Yolanda into the water. As she ineffectually attempted to struggle the Brontoscorpio's grasp, she bashed her head on the tank walls; she was unconscious. As her barely conscious body fell into the water, the Brontoscorpio began to mob her, like vultures about a kill on the African savannah, fighting over who would be the first to claim this unexpected bounty.

Nikolai, somehow remaining cool-headed, turned to Mia and barked "Help her!". Mia promptly climbed into the tank and attempted to grab her unconscious friend. However, she had trouble moving Yolanda out of the pool; her added weight was slowing her down. All she could do was keep Yolanda's head above water, so she could breathe. The Brontoscorpio, easily able to catch up, remorselessly advanced towards her; they would not be cheated of their prey so easily. They surrounded Mia and the unconscious Yolanda, lashing out with the pincers in an attempt to reclaim their prize. Mia yelled from the pool, dodging the pincers of one angered Brontoscorpio lashed out at her, "I need some help!"

Suddenly, Leon, looking intently at the unfolding chaos, put his walkie-talkie and glasses down and began to move closer to the edge of the platform. Nikolai turned to him, with an expression of open-mouthed shock, "Gilbertson, what are you doing?!". In response, Leon turned to Nikolai and smiled, "Facing my fears, once and for all." And then, without warning, he dived into the tank, deaf to any plea or order to stop. Nikolai turned to the keeper operating the doors, "Open the doors to Holding Tank Two; just in case they need some help". As he landed, several Brontoscorpio scattered. For those first few moments, he was blind; he didn't have diving equipment on and the salty water stung his eyes. However, he reached the surface and opened his eyes, ignoring the pain to focus on the more important situation; getting Yolanda and Mia out of here. He soon found Mia, still holding the unconscious Yolanda, being mobbed by several Brontoscorpio, one of which had now grabbed Mia's foot. Leon swam up to it and with all his strength grabbed it, pulling it out of Mia's foot. The Brontoscorpio landed on its back, righting itself quickly and clicking its pincers in a threat gesture towards this unexpected arrival.

Leon turned to Mia, "You hold them off; I'll get her out of here", and began to swim with the unconscious Yolanda, making sure to keep her head above water. However, Leon, weighed down by Yolanda, was swimming rather slowly, and several of the Brontoscorpio were pursuing him. One particularly confident individual clamped its pincer around his foot, attempting to drag him into the water. Within an instant, several more were on him, pulling him in different directions, as he struggled to keep moving forward. Mia's situation was little better; she was being overwhelmed by the Brontoscorpio swarm. She had managed to dislodge several, however, when she had dislodged one, several more proceeded to take its place. They had now surrounded her; there was nowhere she could run. One advanced menacingly towards her and lifted its stinger in the air, chittering in triumph. Suddenly, the Brontoscorpio scattered into all directions, fleeing to every corner of the tank, with some even attempting to climb out and failing.

Mia soon saw the reason why; an enormous female Pterygotus, carrying her young on her back, had entered the tank, looming menacingly over the Brontoscorpio. The Brontoscorpio cowered in the face of this greater predator; all trying to move as far away from it as possible. Their being distracted gave both Leon and Mia time to swim out of the tank and leave, Leon still carrying the unconscious Yolanda. He than emerged from the water and quickly swam to the ladder. After he got out, he checked if the unconscious Yolanda was still breathing. Suddenly, her eyes opened and she weakly smiled, "You idiot; you did all that to save me." She then grabbed him in a clumsy hug, which was met by a sheepish grin by Leon. This moment of intimacy was interrupted when Nikolai cleared his throat and Leon and Yolanda, realizing the position they were in, quickly broke up, blushing. Leon breathed out; boy was he glad Jack wasn't there to see this.

Meanwhile, Drew and Jack were watching the last of the scorpions go through the portal. After the final one had disappeared through, Jack gave out a sigh of relief, "Thank God for that. I'd hate this tale to end with a sting; at least, we had an escape clause." Drew turned to him, confused, "Even frightened, you can't help but make jokes, can you, Jack?" Jack smiled sheepishly and said, "Jokes are my coping mechanism, fearless leader. Make light of the humour in any situation and you'll be OK.". They were interrupted by a large school of Cephalaspis. They were all swimming in a certain direction; it was almost organised. Jack looked at the spectacle and said, "Looks like a migration to me. Wonder where they're heading?"

"I don't know, but I think I have an idea. Come on, let's head back to camp." In response to this, Jack gave Drew a questioning look as to the relevance of getting back on land. After some time of deliberation, he assumed that it was because they needed to collect the Cooksonia; Drew had filled him in that a place in the park was ready for them. Jack was half right, as they carefully gathered a decent amount of Cooksonia from the Silurian beach and placed it onto a large cart, ready to send back to the 21st century. However, after they had finished with that task, Jack saw Drew follow the sea, until his gaze reached a small pond.

Drew walked up to the pond to make sure that his assumption was correct. Jack gaped at the spectacle; crossing a small land bridge into the pond, were hundreds of Cephalaspis. Drew looked at the spectacle and smiled, "As I thought, the Cephalaspis go into freshwater to breed. Given what some fish are like, it's likely that these guys probably hatched from this same pond and, somehow, used both memory and navigation skills to find it again. It's like I always say; life always finds away."

Jack suddenly looked at him, quizzically, "I understand that; I mean, lots of fish do it, like sturgeon. However, there's still one thing I'm still not getting. That one from before fled so suddenly because it somehow detected that Scorpio-zilla was lurking in the sand, before the Brontoscorpio did, right? How?"

Drew turned to him and smiled, "Glad you asked, actually; it's thought that Cephalaspis had sensors in in its skin, like many fish species today, which it could use to detect vibrations. This gave them an early warning system against predators. This is why I'm glad we found them here, otherwise catching them would be a nightmare."

The two continued to watch as fish after fish, one by one, crossed the tiny land bridge into the pond to lay their eggs. However, there were some who never made it across; five Brontoscorpio, attracted by the spectacle, would occasionally grab one and drag it off to be devoured. Drew suddenly turned to see Jack staring at the scorpions open-mouthed; with an expression from beyond the grave, "It's them! The scorpions from before!" Drew gave him a questioning look, "How can you tell that those five are the same ones from before?"

"Because, fearless leader, I have been noticing that every Brontoscorpio has a different shell pattern and I'd recognise those patterns anywhere!" Drew smiled at him and said, "Well, if that's the case, why don't you go apologize to your little friends?" Drew gave Jack a small push and they walked towards the pond. Jack gave Drew a glare as he walked over to the scorpions, stopping once he saw the scorpions noticed him. Paralyzed with fear, he began to stammer, "Oh, erm… well, this is awkward. Hey, guys. Uh, remember me? Yeah, I was just thinking about… well, you know how I kind of rudely interrupted your lunch. Well, how about we let bygones be bygones… would that be OK?" The scorpions ignored him, continuing to grab fish from the throng.

Drew faced palmed at Jack's attempt at a "diversion"; it clearly wasn't working, since the scorpions weren't paying him any attention. However, they seemed distracted anyway; they weren't grabbing any more fish. With them occupied, Drew got closer to the bridge of rock separating the pond from the sea and turned the portal on. Immediately, the Cephalaspis began swimming through the portal, with many disappearing through the glowing orb. Drew kept the portal for about 10 minutes, before, after about seventy had entered the portal, and turned off the portal. Drew, then, turned to Jack who was currently still talking to the scorpions, who were starting to clack their pincers in irritation. Drew rolled his eyes and turned the portal on. Jack grabbed a dead Cephalapsis and threw it through the portal. The Brontoscorpio quintet pursued it, like dogs after a tennis ball.

After shutting it off, Drew and Jack went back to camp, packed up their supplies and grabbed the cart full of Cooksonia, ready to take back through the portal. They turned and gave one last look on the pond which still had Cephalaspis going into it; the immediate threat had been removed, but more Brontoscorpio would find the spawning ground. They turned the portal on, smiled at each other, and pushed the cart through. Once they made it back, they were met with a stern look from Nikolai, "Komandir, please tell me that the only reason you didn't warn us about any of this ahead of time was because the communicator was somehow broken." And, after a brief lecture about why they had the thing in the first place, the animals and plants were put into their new homes.

After a few days, everything had gone back to normal; well, normal for PE, anyway. The Cooksonia were put in a special room in the newly built Discovery Outpost, with a specially simulated Silurian atmosphere and the Cameroceras was fitting in well with the existing school. The Cephalaspis were kept in a large tank which was made up to stimulate a Silurian seabed; it was very sandy, and had lots of algae growing in it. There was even a specially made freshwater part of the tank, separate from the main portion, where the shoal could reproduce, one day. The Pterygotus had been given a fairly large tank and were either swimming or resting at the bottom, waiting for food to arrive. They had proven to be surprisingly docile; they were rather easy for the handlers to feed. The female Pterygotus, who Mia had dubbed Hepetet, was resting on the bottom, covered by sand, waiting for food to arrive. The Brontoscorpio tank had been the easiest to construct; they simply copied the Megalograptus tank. The only noticeable difference was that it had a more prominent land area, in case they wanted to leave the water. And it was currently, their feeding time.

"OK", the feeder thought. "It'll be as easy as putting one foot in front of the other. Just go in, dump the food, and get out before they notice. Don't show any fear; they can sense fear and they'll be drawn to it. Right, here goes everything". He opened the door and with lightning speed, dumped the bucket of fish guts into the water's edge, before he suddenly noticed five large Brontoscorpio in his way. He, just as quickly, ran back, slamming the door behind him so hard it could have fallen off. Jack Denham remained there for a few minutes, panting and wheezing, as he got his breath back; hopefully he wouldn't have to go in there for a while. Suddenly, he heard someone snickering. He turned to see Leon standing, perfectly relaxed, against one of the aquarium walls, barely resisting the urge to laugh. Jack gave him a worried look, "How many this time?". Leon, still smirking with glee, put his hand on his chin and began to think, "Oh, about 12." Jack stared at him for several minutes, completely flabbergasted, before looking at the ceiling and yelling "ARE YOU KIDDING ME?!". Leon walked up to him and said, quite calmly, "Jack, buddy, maybe you should leave this job to a professional. After all, I think the Cameroceras are beginning to miss you."

Jack quickly handed the bucket to Leon and watched as he confidently walked into the enclosure and threw the fish guts. It was surprisingly easy; the Brontoscorpio were not as tame as the Pterygotus, but they definitely weren't as aggressive as the Megalograptus. They weren't even particularly dangerous, as Khatin and the Research Division had found out, when they had studied their venom; they discovered that it wasn't particularly deadly to humans. Leon smiled; he was living evidence of that. It was only until later that he realised that he, Mia and Yolanda had been stung multiple times during their little encounter with them. The only consequence was that they had felt a bit dizzy and nauseous for a couple of days. Jack looked at him, his expression a combination of jealousy and amazement. As soon as Leon exited the tank, wearing a smug smile, Jack took him to one side and whispered in his ear, "Leon, mate, could you teach me how to handle those things?!" Leon stared at him and chuckled; it seemed the student had become the teacher.

Elsewhere Drew was talking to Theodore over the computer. Drew had given him a rundown of the progress they'd made; Theodore had chortled when Drew had related to him the story of Leon and the Megalograptus and had looked overawed at Drew's recount of bringing back the Cameroceras. He smiled at Drew and said, "I have to say, I am proud of the progress you've made. You're succeeding beyond my wildest dreams. I can tell you can't wait for the next mission and, don't worry, it will be soon. But first, I must ask you something; Drew, are you up for a challenge?" Drew smiled, "What kind of challenge?" Theodore grinned, "That's the spirit! Get the whole team ready, there are two places I'd like you to go…"

Next time, the team go back to the Devonian to save one of the first amphibians

(A salamander-like creature emerges from the water)

However, they have to handle the deadliest creatures they've encountered so far; vicious aquatic predators

(An enormous fish hauls itself out onto land)

That make sharks look like goldfish.

(A large, armoured fish grabs and eats a shark)

All next time on Prehistoric Earth: Life In Transition.

Animals brought back:

Cameroceras trentonese: 1 (1 female)

Brontoscorpio anglicus: 36 (18 males, 18 females)

Cooksonia pertoni: 38

Pterygotus anglicus: 9 (5 males, 4 females)

Cephalaspis lyelli: 67 ( 22 males, 45 females)