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A New World

Chapter One

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Joe and his friend started to move away from Ellie, they looked left and right, up and down, they turned in circles…nervous. "Send them away" Joe demanded of her, she shook her head "do it!"

"I can't control them, their not pets that you can teach to beg and sit, you're on your own Mister" the other man grabbed her roughly "let me go!"

"If they eat us for dinner I'm going to make sure you're still here for dessert" he said grimly. She could hear them coming, hear them calling to each other, she tried to pull out of the man's grip but he held her too tight. They aimed their guns into the bushes where leaves had started to rustle "we going to get the hell out of here, Joe, on my count we run back to camp." Joe nodded in agreement and both men and Ellie stepped back, though she had no choice, "1…2…3!" they took off into the trees, the raptors right behind them.

"You can't out run them," Ellie shouted as she was pulled through the trees.

They ignored her "our camp isn't far from here" Joe told her, his breathing was deep, and beads of perspiration trailed down his face.

"You'll lead them to you're friends!" Ellie was started to wish she'd never called the raptors, her plan wasn't turning out quite like she'd expected it to.

"Turner!" Joe screamed, he turned around and fired into the trees, a raptor jumped through the bushes and landed on top of him, Turner and Ellie were ahead of him and barely heard his call, Turner stopped and waited a second before he carried on charging towards his camp.

"Help him!" Ellie tried to pull away from him but Turner dragged her with him.

"He's dead by now" he said softly, a regretful tone was apparent in his voice, but he still left his friend and there was no excusing that, "how many more of them things will there be?" they travelled at a slower pace now.

"They travel in packs, so, three maybe four more" Ellie answered, a few minutes later they came to a stop. Ellie got her first look at their camp, it was small and three tents where in the clearing, side by side. A fire had been lit and two men where sat on either side of it, the thing that caught her attention was the cages that where piled up by boxes of supplies. "What kind of archaeologist needs cages?"

He ignored her question and led her t where the other two men waited for Turner, they looked over his shoulder "where's Joe?" one of them asked, he was well built, his hair a mousy brown.

Turner looked solemnly at him "I'm sorry Graham, we were attacked…" he stopped talking but he didn't need to say anymore, Graham got the point.

The other archaeologist, a short, stocky man named Robert, nodded his head at Ellie "whose this?"

Turner pushed her forward "I don't know yet…do you live here?" She kept her mouth closed, saying nothing "I heard you shouting for someone back there, Tom, and it won't take us long for us to find you're camp, you can't have travelled far. Where are you're parents?"

She hesitated, then "their gone."

Graham looked at her sadly "I'm sorry, how did they die?"

Ellie looked up at him "if they were dead I'd have said so…they were taken, but, they could still be out there…"

Graham leaned down so he was at eye level with her "do you…live here?"

"Listen girl, either you tell us or we'll find the answers out for ourselves!" Turner said angrily.

"You're not archaeologists, are you?"

Turner ignored her question and turned to Robert "keep her in the tent, I'm going hunting."

*

Tom had heard the shot, he'd been on his way to the treehouse, but now he was running to where he'd last seen Ellie, his heart was pounding in his chest, he couldn't get to the lake fast enough. He looked to the ground, Ellie's prints were clear enough, but there were two more, prints he hadn't see before, the lines were zigzag, he quietly followed the tracks, keeping a careful watch, he didn't want to be surprised.

He didn't take him long to find the bloodied body…or what was left of it, he had been dragged quite a distance and the blood had become ingrained in the dirt, a set of three raptor prints were by the body. He now held the rifle that had been slung over his shoulder, in his hands, he was on full alert. Tom heard his would be captor before he set eyes on him, he didn't like what he saw.

TBC