Chapter 2

Crash Landing

The foliage rushed to meet Eric Matthew Kirby as he held his arms up to protect his face from the oncoming branches. Instant pain met him from the immoveable objects as the sudden stop occurred.

Finally moving his hands away and opening his eyes, Eric could see the ground a few feet below them. A groan from behind brought him to turn his head, but he stopped, feeling a sharp pain in his neck.

"Ben?" Eric asked in a whisper, barely able to even get that out.

"It's… I'm here," Ben lowly said back.

"Are you ok?" Eric managed to ask, but he desperately wanted to close his eyes. Fatigue was setting in as the pain continued to pulsate from his neck.

"I think so," Ben said. "But I'm more concerned with you. I think you took the blunt of the crash. You probably have whiplash."

"I'm so tired," Eric admitted.

"You need to stay awake," Ben told him.

"But I just want to sleep," Eric explained.

"We can't stay here, Eric," Ben said. "There's no telling what's out there, and we're too low in the trees if there are predators around."

Eric's eyes snapped open at that. "Right. There could be dinosaurs here."

Ben sighed. "Or something more native to our time. Remember, this is one of The Five Deaths. We don't know what lies here."

Eric could feel Ben's arms moving around him, trying to find the ends of the harness that kept them hooked together. "What are you doing?"

"I'm going to have to let you down first, bud," Ben replied. "Then I can get myself down."

"My neck hurts," Eric told him. "I don't know what's wrong. Should I move?"

"You're going to have to," Ben said. "I need you to reach your arms outward and try to keep from hurting yourself more with this fall."

"I'll try," Eric told him, still fighting the fatigue as it continued to battle him for control.

"You have to do this, Eric," Ben said. "I can't survive this island without you."

"You've been through worse," Eric told him. "I remember that story you told me about getting trapped in that tomb one time in Egypt."

"I had assistants," Ben reminded him. "They worked hard to get me out of there. You're my assistant here, and I need you to work hard."

"I'm your assistant?" Eric asked, his eyes closing again.

"Stay awake, Eric!" Ben snapped.

Eric's eyes snapped opened. "I'm here. I'm here."

"Yes, you're my assistant and a damn good one," Ben told him.

"Language," Eric said.

Ben couldn't hold back a chuckle. "Don't tell your mom."

"Never," Eric promised.

"I'm going to let you down now, okay?" Ben asked.

"I'm ready," Eric told him, holding his hands outward to hopefully catch himself on the fall.

"Alright, one, two, three," Ben counted and then released the harness.

Eric fell away from him and landed on the ground. The mossy grass felt a lot softer than he thought it would be. Rolling over onto his butt, he looked back up into the tree. "I'm ok."

"Alright," Ben said with a relieved sigh. "I'm going to pull myself down now."

"Hey, the camera's still on," Eric stated, having noticed a red light near Ben's right side. "We should save the battery."

Ben looked over to the camera, hanging from his shoulder strap. He reached out, grabbed it, and flipped the power button off. "Alright, just hold on. I'm going to take these straps off and come down. Back off if you can. I don't want to land on you."

Eric slowly tried to get to his feet, but the world began spinning, so he plopped back down and scooted away from the tree encase Ben fell like he had.

Suddenly the straps came loose and Ben fell, landing mere inches from where Eric's legs were. He grunted, looking up, coughing dirt from his mouth.

Eric couldn't help the chuckle that escaped his lips. "Are you ok?"

"Face first in the dirt," Ben sat up. "Could've been worse, I guess."

"Yeah, you could've landed in dino crap," Eric told him.

Ben slowly got to his feet. "Let's get moving. We'll need to go into a Northeasterly direction to get to that village we saw. I think. As long as we're not turned around, that is."

"You have always had a good sense of direction," Eric said. "I trust you."

Ben reached out a hand to Eric, whom accepted it, being pulled to his feet. Clearly the boy was dizzy, and as he looked around everywhere, it was more than obvious he was about to fall.

"Ok, new plan," Ben said as he lifted Eric into his arms and began to carry him toward the nearby edge of the foliage.

"Thank you," Eric said, as he closed his eyes, falling into a deep sleep.

"You're welcome, kiddo," Ben whispered to him.

Moving out of the foliage, Ben could see a large, beaten down path, clearly having been used by multiple creatures over the years. It wasn't man made in the slightest.

"Fuck, it's a game trail," Ben observed.

Quickly, he looked around everywhere, trying to find somewhere to go. There was no telling when animals might show, or if any of them were even friendly, but if it were a game trail as he suspected, they could get trampled no matter how friendly the wildlife might've been.

Something caught his eye. Near a new section of foliage on the other side of the game trail looked like something man made. Ben moved toward it, shifting Eric's weight in hand as he did so. The sound of loud footfalls could be heard in the distance, which caused him to quicken his pace. However, he sighed in relief, once he realized what the manmade object was: some sort of structure held up with massive struts. The top went above the tree line, but it looked to him like some kind of tree house.

"Eric," Ben said.

Eric groaned. "Five more minutes, mom."

Ben shook Eric slightly. "Come on, Eric."

Eric opened his eyes. "Ben? Where are we?"

"Somewhere safe, I hope," Ben told him. "We need to climb. You have to grab around my neck and stay awake. I can't have you falling off of me halfway up. We'll rest once we're at the top. I promise."

The sounds of the footfalls finally caught Eric's attention. "What is that?"

"Something's coming," Ben replied. "Are you ready?"

Eric nodded and moved out of Ben's grip, going to stand behind Ben. He wrapped his arms around him and waited.

Ben climbed as quickly as he humanly could with someone on his back. It was a hard process, but there was nothing else for it. He was just glad to be in such top physical shape. Otherwise, this would've been impossible to pull off no matter how sturdy the structure was. It rather impressed him.

He glimpsed something part way up. It looked like a logo of some kind: TMFS. He'd seen that logo many times before on some of his own expedition equipment.

"I'll be damned," Ben whispered. "Doc Thorne."

"Huh?" Eric asked, having not heard what he was saying.

The footfalls got louder, shaking the ground and the struts as well.

"Whatever's coming, it's massive," Ben stated, deciding to wait on explaining what he'd discovered till later.

Getting to the top, Ben helped Eric to move over the side and into the structure before climbing in himself. They looked back just in time to see a gray, scaly form moving out of the foliage. The long neck caused them to have to crane upward as shock crossed their faces.

"It's an Apatosaurus," Eric whispered, awestruck.

"My God," Ben stated. "Those men on the mainland… They weren't kidding."

Three more Apatosaurs followed the first one around the corner. Close behind were crested dinosaurs with beautiful colors, obviously much smaller than the previous ones.

"Parasaurolophus," Eric said.

"This is incredible," Ben told him. "How the hell is it even possible? An actual lost world."

"We've got time to find out," Eric said.

That was when a loud, ear piercing shriek sounded out, and the attack came seconds later, seemingly from out of nowhere.