As Drew, Alice and Leon went further into the mangroves,. The conversation was interrupted by a low, trumpeting honk.
A small group of animals were paddling through the shallows, browsing on vegetation both above and below the waterline. They were small; the largest was about three feet high at the shoulder, about as big as a large pig. They had bodies that looked like pygmy hippos, with the same greyish-brown colouration; however, they had long, tapir-like noses, which drooped over their mouths, giving them a rather comical look.
Leon knew what they were immediately, "They're Moeritherium. They look like hippo-pig-tapir things, but, as the noses can tell you, they're actually a primitive type of elephant; they use them for gathering vegetation underwater." Alice nodded "One question; how are we going to get them through the portal?" Drew smiled, "I have an idea".
That idea was to make a trail of vegetation, leading from the shore to the portal, and letting the Moeritherium follow it. Once they had gotten close enough, Drew opened the portal, allowing them go through, one by one, into the present.
After the last Moeritherium had gone through, Leon turned to Drew and asked, "Alright, what next?" Drew was about to answer when a loud chorus of whoops and chatters echoed from nearby. Following the sound, they turned the corner to see a small troop of primates standing at the banks of a mangrove-lined channel. A bunch of roots protruded noticeably from the other side of the channel
Watching, they could look at the primates in more detail. There was a vague similarity between them and the Godinotia back at the park; they were about the same size and had similar long tails. However, there were differences; their faces were flatter, as opposed to the more pointed snouts of the Godinotia and their eyes were, proportionately, smaller than those of the Godinotia.
Alice looked at them and said, "These are… Apidium, right?" Leon nodded, "One of the earliest members of the monkey family; a pretty common sight here. They'd probably normally leap across the river, but this channel is probably too wide to jump, so they're going to walk across the roots." Drew arched his eyebrow, "Assuming they're like monkeys, they're not going to be good swimmers; that means the crossing's going to be pretty dangerous…"
Suddenly, there was a flurry of splashes and the monkey nearest to the water simply disappeared with a shriek. The troop fled back to the trees, shook the branches and howled at the channel as blood appeared in the water and a grey fin cut the surface – the Apidium had been killed by a shark.
Drew, Alice and Leon waited until the troop calmed down from the attack before attempting to send them through the portal. They repeated the trick they'd used with the Moetherium, only making a trail of fruit, rather than a trail of leaves. They sat and waited, allowing the whole troop of monkeys to follow it; once they had gotten close enough, Drew activated the portal, allowing them to go through, one by one, into the present. Once the last Apidium had gone through, Alice turned to Drew and asked, "What's the plan?" Drew smiled, "We get back to the Mariner; I have an idea to help us find some Basilosaurus."
Meanwhile, in Pakistan, the team had followed the trail of the Andrewsarchus for about an hour. As they walked along the beach, the winds drove the sand across the beach into a low, stinging layer. Suddenly, the wind changed directions; and the scent of rotting meat blew on the air. Jack wrinkled his nose, "Smells like something died." Cynthia gave him a cold look, and sarcastically stated, "Very astute. Rather interestingly, the smell's coming from where the Andrewsarchus was headed towards. We follow the smell, we find him." After about twenty minutes more walking, they came to a large, upturned log. Climbing over it, they came upon the dead.
The next mile or so of beach was festooned with corpses; what looked like several dead sharks, dead turtles and even a young (well, only about twenty feet long) Basilosaurus all lay, in varying stages of decay. Adrian muttered under his breath, "Jeez; it looks like the storm we saw in the Jurassic." Looking around, Cynthia said, "That must have been what he was headed for; that much meat lying in the sun would keep a predator fed for days." Jack gave her a puzzled look, "Well, where is he, then?"
Suddenly, they heard a low, throaty bark, like some kind of gigantic dog and the movement of something running along the sand. They quickly raced behind the log as a large creature ran towards them. It looked around and snarled; whatever interlopers it had smelled obviously weren't here anymore. It bent down to feast on a dead turtle, cracking open its shell with a single bite.
As it feasted, they got a good look at it. It looked like a cross between a dog, a hyena and a bear. Its fur was orange and patterned in a combination of black stripes and spots. It had the body of a hyena, with longer front legs, a slightly sloping back, and a short-dog like tail. Unlike a dog, however, its four-toed feet had hooves instead of claws and it lacked the dewclaw so typical of carnivorans However, it was much bigger; on all fours, it was almost six feet tall, and its large, dog-like head was almost three feet long. Its muzzle was flecked with blood as it feasted on a dead turtle. Jack breathed out, "That's an Andrewsarchus?" Adrian nodded, "Must be; now, how are we going to get him through the portal?" Cynthia turned to Jack and Adrian and said, "Wait right there. I have an idea." Jack looked at her, perplexed; what did she have planned?
Her plan was, apparently, to get up from behind the log and start walking towards the giant carnivore! As she got closer to it, she clapped her hands. At the sound, the Andrewsarchus turned towards her, hackles raised and snarled. However, Cynthia, unfazed, kept on walking towards it. She dived out of the way and the Andrewsarchus went through, into the park. "Ole." Jack looked at her, surprised, "So… what do we do next?" Cynthia smirked, "Take a wild guess."
Meanwhile, back at the park, Kyle, Nikolai and Yolanda were standing by a transport truck in Theropod Kingdom; Zira, the huge female Tyrannosaurus, who had been in the vet station for a checkup, was being returned to her paddock. At Kyle's signal, the door of the truck opened and the huge female Tyrannosaurus strolled out into the paddock. After she walked a few steps into the paddock, she let out a loud, screeching roar. After a few minutes, Zira's mate Claudandus emerged from the forest and walked towards her, their offspring Terry and Gigas following close behind. Claudandus walked up to his mate and briefly nuzzled her; reaffirming their pair bond.
Watching this little family scene, Kyle, Nikolai and Yolanda were unsurprised to see that Sue, the adolescent female T-rex, was hanging round in the distance; in the six months since the incident, she'd started hanging around the main tyrannosaur family, sticking with them wherever they went, whilst staying at a respectable distance. Leon had looked at her behaviour and had said that Sue was trying to get accepted into the main Tyrannosaurus family. For protection, they reasoned. Over the six months, Zira and her family had come to tolerate this, allowing Sue to follow them… from a distance of course.
Which reminded them…
Yolanda scanned the paddock, "Where's Sharptooth? I'd have thought he'd have been cruising around for a bit of payback." Kyle shrugged, "He's probably hiding somewhere on the other side of the paddock; for the past six months, we've pretty much seen hide nor claw of him." Nikolai nodded, "He generally keeps away from the other rexes except during feeding time. There's no particular reason why this should have changed now." Yolanda nodded; ever since Sharptooth had lost to Zira in the breakout, he'd pretty much disappeared. Outside of feeding times, the staff had barely seen him in six months.
Maybe Sharptooth was sulking in the aftermath of his defeat. Maybe he was avoiding Zira because she had bested him and he was keeping out of her territory. Or maybe he was just an antisocial old grump.
The theories were endless. And Yolanda had no time to pontificate on them. Turning to Kyle and Nikolai, she asked "Is it OK if I leave? I have something I need to do in the Eocene Forest section." Kyle and Nikolai looked at each other and Kyle said, "Absolutely; we haven't got any need of you here. Go where you can be most effective." Yolanda nodded, turned on her heel and left. Lifting her communicator, she said, "Will? Meet me at the Eocene Forest in about ten minutes; and bring the three baby Leptictidium with you."
Meanwhile, in Eocene Egypt, Drew, Alice and Leon had returned to the Mariner and were searching the waterways for Basilosaurus. With a rather unusual bait. Drew said to his team, smiling, "We're not going to be using chum as bait for the Basilosaurus; it's more likely to attract sharks than what we're looking for. What we are going to use is this." Drew put a large underwater loudspeaker in front of them. He continued, "When we arrived, we recorded animal vocalisations in the sea. After this, we isolated the Basilosaurus vocalisations and we're going to play them back using the speaker. They'll think it's another one of them and come towards the boat." Leon nodded, "They've used that to attract whales… with mixed results, if I recall correctly."
Lowering the speaker into the water, they activated it and a long, low, mornful-sounding call echoed through the water; the call of an apex predator. Hopefully, the apex predators in question would be fooled. The Mariner began cruising the river channels, in search of the great, predatory whale.
After a few hours of searching, no Basilosaurus were in evidence. So, to while away the time, Leon went up to Alice and asked, "About before… when I was trying to talk to you?" Alice nodded, "Yeah." Leon looked around awkwardly and said, "Does Yolanda really feel the same way about me?" Alice nodded, "Well, she's never told me, but I can guess from the way she talks about you or interacts with you." Leon then nodded, "How do I tell her how I really feel about her?" Alice shrugged, "You just tell her, I guess; those who hesitate are lost." She smiled, "All these questions, Leon; I've never been in this situation before. I've never confessed my feelings to anyone." Leon shrugged and looked around, "Well, I mean, somebody might be trying to confess them to you and you just don't know about it yet". To this statement, Alice looked at him curiously, "What on Earth are you talking about?"
Suddenly, they heard a loud, honking, distressed bellow. They knew what the sound was immediately; Leon turned to Alice, "It's a Moeritherium." Alice nodded, "And it sounds like it's in a pretty bad way. Maybe we should take a little detour." Suddenly, at the back end of the boat, a large, fluked tail emerged and hit the water; Alice and Leon got a brief glimpse of a large, serpentine shape swimming through the water. Drew came running up to them and said, "It's a Basilosaurus. And it's heading for the Moeritherium." He smiled, "Don't you always like it when this happens? We get a Basilosaurus and an extra Moeritherium, all in the same place." And so the Mariner headed through the waterways, after the Basilosaurus.
