Rushing towards the cawing sound from their camp, they found that some of their equipment had been torn open, by some creature clearly in a massive hurry. The attack angle looked chaotic, as if it had been done quickly, an attempt to nick some food whilst their backs were turned. The caw must have been an alarm call before it had retreated. Drew looked around the wreckage and said, "Whatever did this must have been looking for food; the meat that was part of our rations. They didn't get anything; those bags we use are near impossible to tear open. They can withstand grizzly bears."
Suddenly, their trains of thought were interrupted by a very familiar squawk. Standing on a log nearby, they found a very familiar Rhamphorhynchus, nibbling his fur clean. The Rhamphorynchus gave them a puzzled look, as if to say "Why are you all so surprised?" Adrian looked, flabbergasted, "Keehar?! How did you get here?" Jack chuckled fondly, "The jammy little sod must've snuck through the portal". Keehar chirped in affirmative and hopped towards Adrian. Drew rolled his eyes, raised his communicator and went, "Hi, Linda. If you're looking for Keehar, he snuck through the portal; he's with us… And he's probably torn up our camp in search of food."
Jack turned to Drew and went, "Umm, Drew, one small correction; Keehar didn't do this." Drew turned to him and said, "What makes you say that? The angles of the damage indicating there were multiple attackers? The tears indicating that these things had sharp teeth and large well-developed claws? Or the fact that the call we heard before we headed back to camp was clearly not Keehar's?" Jack looked around, furtively, and said "Well, there is that, fearless leader, but the clincher for me is the series of theropod-looking footprints walking away from our camp and into the forest." Jack gestured to a series of three-toed prints walking away from the camp and into the undergrowth. Drew bent down to look at them; there was something weird about them. For some reason, the second toe wasn't leaving an outline…
Drew looked up and smiled, "Right, well, we know where we're headed." Adrian gave him a quizzical look, "Something just attacked us and you want to find them?" Drew shrugged and said, "Well, yeah." Jack gestured towards Keehar and asked, "One last thing, fearless leader; what are we going to do with him? Send him back?" Drew sighed and said, "We'd best take him along. In case we need him."
Meanwhile, back at the park, Leon was continuing his work with Drogon, Rhaegal and Viserion. It had been almost two months since he had begun his training programme; they had been both whistle-trained and responded to verbal commands. Now, it was time to step it up a notch; to see if they could herd the lure into a certain point. Leon, using a remote control, moved a dinosaur-shaped lure into the enclosure at high speed. As usual, the three allosaurs dived after the lure, pursuing it wherever it went, snapping at it like sheepdogs. However, suddenly, as Leon turned the lure towards the door, Drogon dived in front of it, snapping at it and causing it to move backwards. Leon smiled; this was turning out entirely as planned. As he attempted to move the lure right, Rhaegal blocked its way, forcing it to move back the way it came. Viserion hampered an attempt to move the lure towards the bottom fence. Eventually, the allosaurs boxed the lure into a corner. Drogon hesitated, as did the others, and turned to look at Leon, as if waiting for a command. Leon said, "Leave", and the three the three allosaurs backed off, allowing the lure to leave the paddock. After this, Leon threw them each a piece of meat; training was going well.
Suddenly, he heard someone clearing their throat. He turned around to see Yolanda standing behind him. She looked shyly at him, "HI. You weren't answering your walkie-talkie." Leon shrugged and said, "I was busy", gesturing to the allosaurs, "So, why are you here? Dropped in to visit?" Yolanda chuckled, "If only. I just wanted to tell you; you're needed at Mesozoic Safaris. There's been a little situation."
Leon sighed. "Sure. Tell Kyle I'll be there in five minutes." His training session had finished anyway; and, besides, this problem at Mesozoic Safaris sounded like it was urgent.
Meanwhile, Drew, Jack and Adrian were moving through the undergrowth of the Cretaceous forest. Keehar, meanwhile, was flying above them, looking around nervously and staying close to Adrian. As the team walked through the undergrowth, they noticed something different compared to the Jurassic. Aside from the ferns and horsetails they had seen in the Jurassic, there were primitive flowers of various colours pockmarked throughout the undergrowth. They briefly stopped to look at a bright purple one. Drew said, "These are the first flowering plants; beautiful, aren't they?" Jack breathed out and said, "Amazing, isn't it? Everything from the largest oak tree to the smallest dandelion… all started with these tiny flowers."
Suddenly, botany became a secondary concern as the undergrowth rustled. Drew, Jack and Adrian looked in the approximate direction the sound had come from. Keehar sniffed the air and squeaked in fear. However, nothing emerged and, disturbed by what had transpired, they walked on.
As they headed deeper into the forest, something would move through the undergrowth periodically; this increased in frequency as they went deeper. Suddenly, they walked out of the thick undergrowth into a large clearing. The canopy was particularly thin and the undergrowth plants were comparatively reduced.
Adrian turned to Drew and asked, "What do we do?" Drew turned to his teammates and said, "Scan the trees; this is perfect habitat for Microraptor. They're probably here some-". Suddenly, Keehar squawked in alarm as the undergrowth rustled all around them. Suddenly, a familiar barking caw echoed through the clearing. The three adventurers all turned to each other in a shock realisation; whatever creatures had attacked the camp had been following them as they'd walked through the forest.
The caws got louder and louder as the undergrowth, before a theropod dinosaur emerged in the clearing in front of them. It was about four feet long and came up to the three humans' waists; its body was covered in thick, green-brown feathers, apart from its face. It had a long snout, a mouth full of sharp teeth and large, intelligent-looking amber eyes. It stood on two powerful hind legs, with three-toed taloned feet; the second toe was larger than the others and held aloft, tipped in a vicious-looking, sickle-shaped claw. The creature cocked its head curiously at them. Keehar squawked loudly at it and it hissed at him in response, teeth and claws bared, causing the little pterosaur to hide behind Adrian.
Drew knew what it was, "According to the info-packs, this is Mei long. A kind of troodont found in these forests. This must be one of the ones that attacked the camp; we walked into their territory." Suddenly, the Mei threw back its head and cawed loudly; several others cawed in reply. The three humans backed closer to each other and Keehar hid behind Adrian, as the undergrowth rustled all around them. Suddenly, several more burst out from different angles, surrounding them. Jack turned to Drew, "If you've got a plan, fearless leader, now would be a brilliant time to implement it." Drew turned to Jack and said, "Pass me the bait bag." Jack said, quietly, "Why?" Drew turned to him and said, "There's meat in the bag; we can distract them from us." Jack quietly passed the bag to Drew, not trying to anger the troodonts. Once Drew had been given the bag, he grabbed a dead rat from the bag and threw it away from them. The troodonts followed the dead rat and eagerly began fighting over it. Drew used the distraction to activate the portal and threw another, larger rat through it. The troodonts dived after it, moving as if a unified entity. After the last one had gone through, Drew shut off the portal.
Meanwhile, back at the park, Leon had arrived at Mesozoic Safaris to see Kyle, Yolanda, several of the keepers and some of the security personnel, including Collete, standing by one of the viewing areas. Leon walked towards Kyle and said, "Sorry for being late, I was busy with the allosaurs. What's going on?" At the mention of the allosaurs, several of the crowd tittered; Leon sighed. Many still thought the allosaur training a harebrained scheme doomed to end in failure. That was the problem, Leon reflected, when people thought of you as "the useless one"; no plan you came up with was trusted.
He put his mind back to the task at hand; he had to find out why Kyle had called him over. Kyle turned to look at Leon and went, "In recent days, the male Stegosaurus have become incredibly aggressive; they've been fighting amongst themselves rather violently, as well as picking fights with the other animals. We need you to figure out why."
One of the young male Stegosaurus charged at a tranquilly browsing Plateosaurus, causing the smaller prosauropod to turn and run at the sight of this angered herbivore. The stego snorted in triumph, before rubbing his cloaca against the tree. Leon scanned the herbivore intently; was there anything that could indicate the cause of this bizarre behaviour. Leon noticed that the stego had scent-marked and that his plates were flushed red, which could only mean…
"Got it!", Leon yelled, leading to confused looks from everyone around him. Leon elaborated, "It must be breeding season for them; their bodies are pumped up with testosterone, ready for fighting over mates. However, it's making them extremely aggressive towards anything that's angering them. Think like musth in elephants."
In response to this, Kyle arched his eyebrow; he knew what Leon was talking about. When he was a young keeper, the African bull elephant at a zoo he was at was borderline nightmarish when he was in musth; he had been near impossible for the keepers to control. Here, there were several male stegos to deal with; how Leon could find a solution to this would be a mystery. As if reading his thoughts, Collete went, dryly, "What are you waiting for? Three cheers? You can't just say what's happening; tell us what to do about it."
Leon, remembering himself, looked sheepishly and said, "It's only temporary, they're going to snap out of it once breeding season is over. I have an idea about how to get it under control, but it'll take some time to implement. For now, we just keep the male stegs under constant surveillance and interfere when they start getting aggressive again."
Whilst this was happening, Linda was treating Cirrus in the veterinary offices, cleaning the massive pterosaur of any potential skin parasites. The giant Ornithocheirus went along with this treatment stoically, even though he didn't like it, holding his head high as Linda rubbed the treatment into his fur. Linda, after she had finished applying the treatment, turned to the giant pterosaur and said, "Well, you've certainly behaved well. I had to practically pin Keehar down before he'd let me put this on him." Cirrus cawed in affirmative. Giggling, Linda briefly tickled Cirrus under the beak, to which he let out a little, delighted chuff, before she left to look at whatever animals Drew and Jack had brought back.
