David emerged out of the dark forest, the unconscious Ethan being dragged along behind him. Joanna walked a few steps behind, arms folded and shivering. They had expected to find one of the vehicles waiting for them, so they were very surprised to find not only that, but the rest of the group waiting for them as well. Steve, who had been perched on the hood of a jeep, jumped to his feet and walked over to David, an obvious look of anxiety in his eyes.
"Where's Jim? we've lost total contact with the other group who went off earlier", he asked, "We kept trying to reach them through the communications unit in the Land Rover, but there has been no response".
He then noticed Ethan's bruised body lying on the ground, where David had temporarily rested him. He then saw Jo, looking at him through terrified eyes, as well as the absence of the Captain. It then dawned on him the severity of what they must have just been through. David looked at Steve with a simple tired gaze and replied to the query.
"What"? he said, "What do you mean lost contact?"
"They won't reply, we have no idea where they are, I fear something terrible has happened, where's Jim, I need to speak with him immediately", Steve said, becoming more fearful of the island. The latter, he thought, was an almost definite answer.
"Jim went to find the Captain", David responded bluntly. He then staggered to one of the jeeps, and rested against it. Steve curiously replied.
"Why? Did he run off or something?", he asked.
David looked at the bewildered young man.
"No", he said.
A gunshot rang out in the night sky, causing some of the group to 'jump' at the unexpected sound. Two more shots then followed this. David looked uneasily into the darkness surrounding the jungle, as did the rest of the group.
Jim had caught up with the Carnotaur, and fired at the beast's belly, intending to make it suffer after it had devoured the Captain. The creature groaned in pain.
Jim then fired again, hitting the beast in the neck. He planned on making it bleed to death, rather than ending its existence with a bullet to the brain. It snapped and snarled angrily at him, as he sat crouched and holding his rifle.
The beast started to cough. It stopped noticing Jim's presence momentarily and seemed to be gagging on something in its throat. The Carnotaur wretched and thick saliva seeped out of its gullet, followed by an object heavily coated with the slimy mucus. After having regurgitated, it wandered away from the area. Satisfied with the damage he had managed to inflict upon it, Jim let the beast go realising it would probably fall soon due to its wounds anyway.
As he walked towards the object that had been deposited onto the floor, he noticed its strange shape. He knelt over it and then realised with disgust what it was. The Captain's ribcage lay gnawed, in the dust; a grotesquely damaged left arm attached to it. The creature had swallowed the torso whole, and in Jim's attack against it, caused it to throw up part of its last meal.
He pulled out a bag, and with great repulsion, picked up the remains to take back with him. He hoped that at least part of the Captain could receive a decent burial, rather than travel through the digestive system of a prehistoric lizard.
"No beast can outhunt man", he said to himself, as he made his way back to the others. He felt an inner strength as he said these words.
The sight of Jim emerging from the trees filled everyone with relief. He had made it, and presumably the beast hadn't. Steve couldn't help but notice the dark bag slung over his shoulder.
"Jim, so pleased to see you, we have a real problem here", David said, walking over to meet his friend.
"I gathered that when I saw you lot standing there", replied Jim, his voice full of a darkness that unnerved David.
"Yes, well, we can't get into contact with the other group", he explained.
"Never-mind, I know how we can find them", said Jim, "Jack can you pull out the heat sensor equipment, we are going to need it if we are ever going to locate those idiots".
Steve was still looking at the bag.
"Umm, Jim, what's in that bag exactly?" he asked with a simple but cautious curiosity.
"Oh, its what's left of the Captain", came the reply, as if it was nothing of great importance.
This answer was not what Steve had wanted to hear. Mike had also heard the answer and immediately felt weird within himself. The Captain had been mean to him moments before his death. It was almost as if he was getting his just desserts, although it was a little over the top in Mike's thinking.
Jack opened the rear of the Land Rover, and extracted a fairly large device, which showed sensors and a large screen. It seemed to be a type of radar. Jack flipped a switch; the detailed map that showed up revealed to everyone that it seemed to be a rather fancy GPS, complete with contour lines and other topographical details. Various yellow blips were shown on the screen, including the cluster indicating themselves, all huddled together in the hostile environment.
Since the map showed the whole island, when zoomed out anyway, every thing that emitted heat was present on the screen. Many yellow blips moved around, some not too far away, which caused concern amongst them.
"How can we tell them apart from the dinosaurs", David queried.
Jim smiled. He then gestured for Sarah to come over.
"Show them how its done", he then said with a smile to her.
She typed a code into a keypad on the machine, causing a change in the screen display.
"Alright everyone, this thing not only can sense heat, but can also sense other things including phone signals", she explained to them. Mike just sat smiling at her, pushing away the thoughts of death from his mind. She caught him, but before he could sheepishly turn away she gave him a smile back. He blushed at this and turned away anyway. Karen glared from the back of the group.
She flicked a switch and quite a few red dots flickered on the screen. There was one shown at the group, Jim's phone, one that had been carried down the river that had previously belonged to David and quite a few others dotted around the island.
"That's more than I wanted to show up", Jim said, with a half smile. Perhaps to some it would be quite amusing to realise how many phones had been left on the island, evidently from the first hunters that had arrived in 1997. During the dino attacks they must have simply dropped the expensive pieces of equipment while on the run. That meant that abandoned phones would also probably be good indicators to where the Tyrannosaur and Velociraptor nests and game trails were located. It was however a pain, since it made it extremely difficult to track the group whom had gone off to set up camp.
"I think we'll just have to use our initiative on this one", he said to Sarah, who nodded a reply.
"Okay everyone, get into a vehicle, we're going", he explained to the rest of them.
Everyone obliged to this order, gladly getting a move on so they didn't have to uncomfortably wait in the dark like an easy target for predators to pick off.
The line of transport rumbled through the dark, once again across the plains. All though it was a very warm climate by day, the temperature cooled a bit at night, most likely because it was on a small island surrounded by a huge ocean. Everybody welcomed the drop in warmth, even though it was only slight.
Jim had placed what had been left of the Captain into a cool box that wasn't in use, much to the distaste of Mike who had to sit near it in the vehicle. Once the expedition was over, they would give him a burial at sea, if this expedition ever ends, thought Jim.
Within five minutes they had reached the area that seemed most likely to be the lost group, or part of it anyway. Jim stopped the Land Rover and got out. He looked down into a shallow ravine, which confirmed his expectations. It was however, not as he had expected it, as one of the vehicles had been ripped apart, completely gutted of equipment and resources.
"Oh, Shit", hissed Jim, "This really isn't good". He was unable to believe that even more members of the group had been presumably killed.
Jim, David and Steve made their way down to the wrecked Land Rover, to assess the damage. The rest waited at the top, along with Hans with his rifle, covering them in case they needed his destructive assistance. As each Land Rover had been fitted with one of the 20mm cannons from the converted boats that brought them to island, the first thing that David noticed was its absence.
"What the Hell did this?", he said, with a hint of caution in his voice. There was something about the situation that terrified him deeply, but it seemed to be in the depths of his mind.
"Probably some kind of large predator, a T-Rex or even a Spinosaur, whatever it was, we must be on the look out at all times", Jim replied, cocking his rifle as if to punctuate his last remark.
The missing weapon, which had been mounted on the vehicles to deal with extremely large dinosaurs, was indeed worrying. The same had been done with the jeeps and the 50.cal machine guns. Purely for protection. Surely it must be around here somewhere, thought David, if a huge predator attacked it would probably have ripped the weapon off and thrown it into the bushes. The poor bastards must have been ambushed by a T-Rex, he thought, surely that was the answer.
"Where the Bloody Hell are the others?", David asked, feeling uneasy about the whole situation.
"I imagine they must have managed to escape, but where to I don't know", replied Jim, who was carefully surveying the immediate environment.
Boris and Sarah came down as well, to get a closer look at the mess. Steve meanwhile walked around the destroyed LR, looking closely for clues of how the attack may have happened.
"It was most likely that Spinosaur that did this", said Boris giving his opinion. However Sarah shook her head.
"I don't think that...", she was about to say, but.
"Aaarggh", screamed Steve as he fell back onto the ground. He had lifted away one of the doors, and to his horror, had found one of the members of the team.
They all went to see what had given Steve a fright, and were repulsed at what they layed their eyes upon. The state the man was in was just awful. To make matters worse he was still alive.
A badly injured man lay before them, bleeding from the mouth. Both his legs had been taken off in the attack, leaving behind gnarled stumps. A wheezing breath came from his mouth as he tried to say something. Jim knelt down to hear what the dying man was trying to whisper.
"A...a...ambush", he struggled to say. As Jim heard this one thought came into his mind. That Velociraptors had been responsible for the attack.
"An ambush", Jim repeated clearly, so that the others knew what had happened, "Raptors", he then said to himself. The rumours were true, he continued to think, they truely are as intelligent as Grant once said.
Jim turned towards David.
"They chewed his Goddamned legs off", he said coldly. The leg-less man was trying to say something else at that point. Jim leaned in again to hear.
"K...k...kill...m...me", he wheezed, eyeing Boris' 54. Pistol. He had had enough of the pain and wanted them to end his suffering for him. Jim grimaced at the request. He had shot plenty of animals in his lifetime, but never another human.
"He wants us to kill him", explained Jim, feeling a sickness come over him. Boris had killed before, since he had been a Spetznatz agent, unbeknown to anyone but himself. Jim couldn't kill the man, and he knew Steve definitely wouldn't, nor his friend David. Boris spoke up to end the anxiety.
"I'll do it", he said quietly. The injured man nodded his head as confirmation for the act of mercy.
Everyone looked away, as Boris drew out his pistol.
He pulled the trigger, and the bark of his weapon echoed through the forest, as a bullet penetrated the man's skull, killing him instantly, and ending the horrific pain he had been living with.
"We're dealing with raptors now", Jim clearly explained to everyone when they had reached the top again, "So I want everyone to be extra vigilant from now on".
David couldn't believe what he was hearing.
"After all that has happened, you still want to proceed with the expedition?" he cut in angrily.
"Of course", replied Jim, "I haven't got what I came here to get yet, I will not leave this island till I have hunted Raptors", he said firmly.
"I knew this was a bad idea in the first place", spat David, "I insist that we find those others if they're still alive, but then we should all get the Hell out of here as soon as possible".
Jim grew exceptionally annoyed at his friend's reluctance to obey orders. He walked up to David threateningly and said through his teeth.
"Listen, you will obey my orders, I am in command here and you will not tell me what to do", he said, his voice hardening with rage.
"It's just this type of thing that killed your wife", David replied.
This comment was what pushed Jim into losing control. Unable to prevent himself, he drew back his arm and punched David hard in the face, causing blood to gush out of his nose. David stumbled back into the dirt as Jim booted him in the ribs.
"You bastard", he yelled, "Don't you ever say that again, and if you do so help me God, I will kill you". He then stormed off, leaving David in an equally angry state.
"That's it, I'm leaving this Godforsaken island, there's two boats you know", he yelled back. He saw Jim walk through the jungle alone, totally ignoring his reply. David managed to calm himself down before turning to the others.
"If you want out of this expedition now is the time to say so", David hoped he wouldn't be the only one to leave, but that thought was gladly pushed aside as nods of agreement affiliated themselves with David's idea. Most of the people around him wanted the same thing, and it was only a few who opted to stay behind with Jim. Predictably, Hans made it clear that he wanted to stay, much to the anger of Herman, who wished his brother could just learn to respect danger. Jack also wanted to stick to the hunt, as did Steve. However, that was it. Just four people were staying on the island. Everyone else wanted to get the Hell out of there.
"Good, that's a good number of you all, we can return to the boats and set off", David replied, feeling a little better that at least he could return home on his own accord. Had only a couple of people wanted to go with him, he wouldn't have been able to use a boat due to the amount of people and equipment and would have had to instead wait on the beach until the expedition was over.
He then turned to the members who had decided to stay.
"Well I would advice it that you follow him and explain the situation, I hope you all make it", David told Hans and the two others.
"We will, have a safe journey back, I guess a life of extreme danger isn't for you", replied Hans, chuckling at the last part.
"Thank you", David replied simply. The two groups parted, and went their separate ways.
"Where's Jim? we've lost total contact with the other group who went off earlier", he asked, "We kept trying to reach them through the communications unit in the Land Rover, but there has been no response".
He then noticed Ethan's bruised body lying on the ground, where David had temporarily rested him. He then saw Jo, looking at him through terrified eyes, as well as the absence of the Captain. It then dawned on him the severity of what they must have just been through. David looked at Steve with a simple tired gaze and replied to the query.
"What"? he said, "What do you mean lost contact?"
"They won't reply, we have no idea where they are, I fear something terrible has happened, where's Jim, I need to speak with him immediately", Steve said, becoming more fearful of the island. The latter, he thought, was an almost definite answer.
"Jim went to find the Captain", David responded bluntly. He then staggered to one of the jeeps, and rested against it. Steve curiously replied.
"Why? Did he run off or something?", he asked.
David looked at the bewildered young man.
"No", he said.
A gunshot rang out in the night sky, causing some of the group to 'jump' at the unexpected sound. Two more shots then followed this. David looked uneasily into the darkness surrounding the jungle, as did the rest of the group.
Jim had caught up with the Carnotaur, and fired at the beast's belly, intending to make it suffer after it had devoured the Captain. The creature groaned in pain.
Jim then fired again, hitting the beast in the neck. He planned on making it bleed to death, rather than ending its existence with a bullet to the brain. It snapped and snarled angrily at him, as he sat crouched and holding his rifle.
The beast started to cough. It stopped noticing Jim's presence momentarily and seemed to be gagging on something in its throat. The Carnotaur wretched and thick saliva seeped out of its gullet, followed by an object heavily coated with the slimy mucus. After having regurgitated, it wandered away from the area. Satisfied with the damage he had managed to inflict upon it, Jim let the beast go realising it would probably fall soon due to its wounds anyway.
As he walked towards the object that had been deposited onto the floor, he noticed its strange shape. He knelt over it and then realised with disgust what it was. The Captain's ribcage lay gnawed, in the dust; a grotesquely damaged left arm attached to it. The creature had swallowed the torso whole, and in Jim's attack against it, caused it to throw up part of its last meal.
He pulled out a bag, and with great repulsion, picked up the remains to take back with him. He hoped that at least part of the Captain could receive a decent burial, rather than travel through the digestive system of a prehistoric lizard.
"No beast can outhunt man", he said to himself, as he made his way back to the others. He felt an inner strength as he said these words.
The sight of Jim emerging from the trees filled everyone with relief. He had made it, and presumably the beast hadn't. Steve couldn't help but notice the dark bag slung over his shoulder.
"Jim, so pleased to see you, we have a real problem here", David said, walking over to meet his friend.
"I gathered that when I saw you lot standing there", replied Jim, his voice full of a darkness that unnerved David.
"Yes, well, we can't get into contact with the other group", he explained.
"Never-mind, I know how we can find them", said Jim, "Jack can you pull out the heat sensor equipment, we are going to need it if we are ever going to locate those idiots".
Steve was still looking at the bag.
"Umm, Jim, what's in that bag exactly?" he asked with a simple but cautious curiosity.
"Oh, its what's left of the Captain", came the reply, as if it was nothing of great importance.
This answer was not what Steve had wanted to hear. Mike had also heard the answer and immediately felt weird within himself. The Captain had been mean to him moments before his death. It was almost as if he was getting his just desserts, although it was a little over the top in Mike's thinking.
Jack opened the rear of the Land Rover, and extracted a fairly large device, which showed sensors and a large screen. It seemed to be a type of radar. Jack flipped a switch; the detailed map that showed up revealed to everyone that it seemed to be a rather fancy GPS, complete with contour lines and other topographical details. Various yellow blips were shown on the screen, including the cluster indicating themselves, all huddled together in the hostile environment.
Since the map showed the whole island, when zoomed out anyway, every thing that emitted heat was present on the screen. Many yellow blips moved around, some not too far away, which caused concern amongst them.
"How can we tell them apart from the dinosaurs", David queried.
Jim smiled. He then gestured for Sarah to come over.
"Show them how its done", he then said with a smile to her.
She typed a code into a keypad on the machine, causing a change in the screen display.
"Alright everyone, this thing not only can sense heat, but can also sense other things including phone signals", she explained to them. Mike just sat smiling at her, pushing away the thoughts of death from his mind. She caught him, but before he could sheepishly turn away she gave him a smile back. He blushed at this and turned away anyway. Karen glared from the back of the group.
She flicked a switch and quite a few red dots flickered on the screen. There was one shown at the group, Jim's phone, one that had been carried down the river that had previously belonged to David and quite a few others dotted around the island.
"That's more than I wanted to show up", Jim said, with a half smile. Perhaps to some it would be quite amusing to realise how many phones had been left on the island, evidently from the first hunters that had arrived in 1997. During the dino attacks they must have simply dropped the expensive pieces of equipment while on the run. That meant that abandoned phones would also probably be good indicators to where the Tyrannosaur and Velociraptor nests and game trails were located. It was however a pain, since it made it extremely difficult to track the group whom had gone off to set up camp.
"I think we'll just have to use our initiative on this one", he said to Sarah, who nodded a reply.
"Okay everyone, get into a vehicle, we're going", he explained to the rest of them.
Everyone obliged to this order, gladly getting a move on so they didn't have to uncomfortably wait in the dark like an easy target for predators to pick off.
The line of transport rumbled through the dark, once again across the plains. All though it was a very warm climate by day, the temperature cooled a bit at night, most likely because it was on a small island surrounded by a huge ocean. Everybody welcomed the drop in warmth, even though it was only slight.
Jim had placed what had been left of the Captain into a cool box that wasn't in use, much to the distaste of Mike who had to sit near it in the vehicle. Once the expedition was over, they would give him a burial at sea, if this expedition ever ends, thought Jim.
Within five minutes they had reached the area that seemed most likely to be the lost group, or part of it anyway. Jim stopped the Land Rover and got out. He looked down into a shallow ravine, which confirmed his expectations. It was however, not as he had expected it, as one of the vehicles had been ripped apart, completely gutted of equipment and resources.
"Oh, Shit", hissed Jim, "This really isn't good". He was unable to believe that even more members of the group had been presumably killed.
Jim, David and Steve made their way down to the wrecked Land Rover, to assess the damage. The rest waited at the top, along with Hans with his rifle, covering them in case they needed his destructive assistance. As each Land Rover had been fitted with one of the 20mm cannons from the converted boats that brought them to island, the first thing that David noticed was its absence.
"What the Hell did this?", he said, with a hint of caution in his voice. There was something about the situation that terrified him deeply, but it seemed to be in the depths of his mind.
"Probably some kind of large predator, a T-Rex or even a Spinosaur, whatever it was, we must be on the look out at all times", Jim replied, cocking his rifle as if to punctuate his last remark.
The missing weapon, which had been mounted on the vehicles to deal with extremely large dinosaurs, was indeed worrying. The same had been done with the jeeps and the 50.cal machine guns. Purely for protection. Surely it must be around here somewhere, thought David, if a huge predator attacked it would probably have ripped the weapon off and thrown it into the bushes. The poor bastards must have been ambushed by a T-Rex, he thought, surely that was the answer.
"Where the Bloody Hell are the others?", David asked, feeling uneasy about the whole situation.
"I imagine they must have managed to escape, but where to I don't know", replied Jim, who was carefully surveying the immediate environment.
Boris and Sarah came down as well, to get a closer look at the mess. Steve meanwhile walked around the destroyed LR, looking closely for clues of how the attack may have happened.
"It was most likely that Spinosaur that did this", said Boris giving his opinion. However Sarah shook her head.
"I don't think that...", she was about to say, but.
"Aaarggh", screamed Steve as he fell back onto the ground. He had lifted away one of the doors, and to his horror, had found one of the members of the team.
They all went to see what had given Steve a fright, and were repulsed at what they layed their eyes upon. The state the man was in was just awful. To make matters worse he was still alive.
A badly injured man lay before them, bleeding from the mouth. Both his legs had been taken off in the attack, leaving behind gnarled stumps. A wheezing breath came from his mouth as he tried to say something. Jim knelt down to hear what the dying man was trying to whisper.
"A...a...ambush", he struggled to say. As Jim heard this one thought came into his mind. That Velociraptors had been responsible for the attack.
"An ambush", Jim repeated clearly, so that the others knew what had happened, "Raptors", he then said to himself. The rumours were true, he continued to think, they truely are as intelligent as Grant once said.
Jim turned towards David.
"They chewed his Goddamned legs off", he said coldly. The leg-less man was trying to say something else at that point. Jim leaned in again to hear.
"K...k...kill...m...me", he wheezed, eyeing Boris' 54. Pistol. He had had enough of the pain and wanted them to end his suffering for him. Jim grimaced at the request. He had shot plenty of animals in his lifetime, but never another human.
"He wants us to kill him", explained Jim, feeling a sickness come over him. Boris had killed before, since he had been a Spetznatz agent, unbeknown to anyone but himself. Jim couldn't kill the man, and he knew Steve definitely wouldn't, nor his friend David. Boris spoke up to end the anxiety.
"I'll do it", he said quietly. The injured man nodded his head as confirmation for the act of mercy.
Everyone looked away, as Boris drew out his pistol.
He pulled the trigger, and the bark of his weapon echoed through the forest, as a bullet penetrated the man's skull, killing him instantly, and ending the horrific pain he had been living with.
"We're dealing with raptors now", Jim clearly explained to everyone when they had reached the top again, "So I want everyone to be extra vigilant from now on".
David couldn't believe what he was hearing.
"After all that has happened, you still want to proceed with the expedition?" he cut in angrily.
"Of course", replied Jim, "I haven't got what I came here to get yet, I will not leave this island till I have hunted Raptors", he said firmly.
"I knew this was a bad idea in the first place", spat David, "I insist that we find those others if they're still alive, but then we should all get the Hell out of here as soon as possible".
Jim grew exceptionally annoyed at his friend's reluctance to obey orders. He walked up to David threateningly and said through his teeth.
"Listen, you will obey my orders, I am in command here and you will not tell me what to do", he said, his voice hardening with rage.
"It's just this type of thing that killed your wife", David replied.
This comment was what pushed Jim into losing control. Unable to prevent himself, he drew back his arm and punched David hard in the face, causing blood to gush out of his nose. David stumbled back into the dirt as Jim booted him in the ribs.
"You bastard", he yelled, "Don't you ever say that again, and if you do so help me God, I will kill you". He then stormed off, leaving David in an equally angry state.
"That's it, I'm leaving this Godforsaken island, there's two boats you know", he yelled back. He saw Jim walk through the jungle alone, totally ignoring his reply. David managed to calm himself down before turning to the others.
"If you want out of this expedition now is the time to say so", David hoped he wouldn't be the only one to leave, but that thought was gladly pushed aside as nods of agreement affiliated themselves with David's idea. Most of the people around him wanted the same thing, and it was only a few who opted to stay behind with Jim. Predictably, Hans made it clear that he wanted to stay, much to the anger of Herman, who wished his brother could just learn to respect danger. Jack also wanted to stick to the hunt, as did Steve. However, that was it. Just four people were staying on the island. Everyone else wanted to get the Hell out of there.
"Good, that's a good number of you all, we can return to the boats and set off", David replied, feeling a little better that at least he could return home on his own accord. Had only a couple of people wanted to go with him, he wouldn't have been able to use a boat due to the amount of people and equipment and would have had to instead wait on the beach until the expedition was over.
He then turned to the members who had decided to stay.
"Well I would advice it that you follow him and explain the situation, I hope you all make it", David told Hans and the two others.
"We will, have a safe journey back, I guess a life of extreme danger isn't for you", replied Hans, chuckling at the last part.
"Thank you", David replied simply. The two groups parted, and went their separate ways.
