CHAPTER 125
Hector limped, and his feet stammered through the mud as he ventured away from the operations building. A huge bruise was swelling up over his right thigh, and it throbbed with every step. As he neared the road that led to the emergency bunker there was no doubt he was being followed. With the smell of blood he was trailing it was purely irresistible for the chattering compsognathus at his heels. As more emerged from the jungle to either side of the road ahead the comps enveloped him in an ever thickening semicircle. Little growls and hissing noises became more prevalent, and the circle of scavengers closed in around him. Its diameter tightened like a noose, and the tiny dinosaurs started to snap their jaws and jump at him.
Hector knew where this was going. It would only be a matter of moments before they were swarming over his body like a legion of large, angry, fire ants that had just had their hill kicked over. He had never seen so many all at once before, and their numbers were growing by the second. There had to be a hundred at least.
If he thought he could sprint the entire distance to the bunker Hector would have done it right then and there, but in his condition there were strong doubts. He stopped walking and looked around. To his right, about thirty yards off was the skid steer he had been using days earlier to fill in the lava tubes. It was right where he'd parked it. Thirty yards was significantly less distance than running all the way to the bunker. If he could make it to the skid steer then he'd certainly have a chance.
In the moment where he felt several of the comps climbing up his legs and clawing him through the fabric of his clothing Hector broke into a sprint. All the pain he felt was shoved to the back of his mind where it became nothing more than a subtle thought and no longer a sensation in his body. He kicked through the crowd of compsognathus and barreled toward the skid steer. As he broke through the ranks of scavengers he still felt one or two clinging to his clothing. Hector didn't care. He didn't stop. He didn't slow down or brush his hands at them. He didn't do anything to distract his mind from running to the skid steer.
Hector's feet hammered through the mud, and the sound of his pounding boots was where he focused. The rapid drum of each footfall meant that he was that much closer. In what passed as a blur he was only ten feet away. Then he tripped.
The fall happened so fast Hector didn't even feel the sensation of the plunge. All he felt was a puddle splash up around his face, and a jarring punch as his nose and chin thrust into the wet earth.
He lifted his forehead. The view of the skid steer's tire treads became his motivation. Hector crawled on his elbows for a few feet then pushed to his hands and knees. The bucket of the tractor was almost within his grasp. He reached out with his arm and his fingers grazed the sharp cutting edge of the one yard bucket.
Hector was about to hoist himself onto the side of the shovel and climb the lift arms to enter the cab, but a comp scurried up his outstretched arm and latched onto his face. As he pried the biting and clawing critter from the skin of his cheek he felt the rush of dozens more compsognathus swarm over his body and sink their teeth and talons into his flesh. He rolled around like a wild flame was dancing over his clothing. His arms punched and grabbed, and his boots kicked. With every compsognathus Hector ripped from his body it seemed a dozen more grabbed on.
Through the swarm of vicious jaws he redirected himself back toward the skid steer. Despite what seemed to be his darkest of hours Hector refused to give up. Battling a flood of tranquilizing venom that surged into his bloodstream he fought to climb the lift arms and get into the skid steer's cab. It was his last hope.