CHAPTER 321
Thump. The sound shook through the ground.
Thump.
Thump.
Thud.
The footfalls were getting closer. The trees in the jungle shook and cracked. Thump thump thump.
King was the first to act. He waved his hands toward the rear cargo door of the Chinook that Thorne and Smith had been piloting. It was the nearest place to find cover. "Everyone get on the chopper now! Come on! Now!"
Dodgson seconded his motion. "Do as he says. Go. Now!" His demeanor had shifted. It was subdued, grave.
Once inside they all turned to look out the door.
"Hey, where's Thorne?" Smith said.
"Never mind that. What the hell is that moron doing?" Dodgson pointed out the door to where George was standing stiff as a board. He faced the direction of the approaching beast. He was totally unmoving. Stella was at his side, the pole still in George's hands.
"George!" King hissed.
"George, god damnit!" Dodgson was louder, almost shouting.
"Hey hey! Quiet." King shook Dodgson's shoulder and pointed toward the tree line just past the other Chinook.
There was movement.
Out of nowhere Smith gasped, "Oh my God, Thorne!" and he bolted from the helicopter toward the two pickup trucks with the flat tires.
"Hey, wait." Sparrow tried to stop him, but Reuben grabbed her.
Reuben pointed to the same movement within the trees that King had spotted. The creature had stopped. It was waiting. The animal was quite obscured yet, but one thing was certain. It was large, very large.
Sparrow looked at Reuben. "What the hell is Smith thinking?"
Reuben was in the midst of conversing with his pocket watch. He side eyed Sparrow and said, "The only thing dumber than a coward is a dumb hero."
Out between the two pickup trucks Smith reached Thorne. "Shit man, you're bleeding."
Thorne was crouched beside the front quarter panel of one of the trucks. He had a cloth tightly bound around his left ankle, and it was saturated with blood.
"Get down, Smith." Thorne motioned him down with a pistol that was in his hand.
Smith crouched next to him. His own pistol was drawn.
Thorne whispered, "It ain't as bad as it looks. Just a scratch."
In the tree line they heard shifting branches. The creature was stirring. Both men peered over the hood and saw a shape that dipped and bobbed between ten and twelve feet off the ground. At times it rose to around fifteen feet from the jungle floor before stooping lower again. The creature wasn't walking. It was just moving in place, and the two men realized that the body part they saw shifting above the forest floor was actually the animal's head.
The two men ducked back down.
"What in the god damned hell is that?" Smith whispered. "It must be huge. That big ass head alone has gotta be larger than you, Thorne."
Smith went for another look over the hood, but Thorne held him back and pointed to the windows on the truck, indicating that they would be more hidden if they peered through the vehicle instead. Smith nodded, and they both shifted down. Spying through both sets of the truck's side windows they watched the creature to see what would happen next.
In the back end of the Chinook where everyone else was hiding Dr. Levine was intent on the beast. Kelly, Arby, and Diego crowded beside her to see what was going on. Dr. Levine kept an unbroken watch on the animal and began to whisper.
"I think we're about to get our first look at an adult specimen. A tyrannosaurus rex, if I'm not mistaken, named Rebirtha."
"How do you know that?" Arby asked.
"In Stella's file there were several references to an adult tyrannosaur with albinism. Look at her skin." Dr. Levine pointed. "Note the absence of pigmentation."
Arby and Kelly squinted, but it wasn't all that difficult to see, even through the occlusion of trees that this creature was scaly and stark white.
Kelly said, "fascinating."
Dr. Levine continued, "even from the scant material there was on Rebirtha I got the impression that skin abnormalities resulting from genetic defects that arose during the engineering process were a common problem. It was clear enough that Rebirtha was not the only one. There was another brief mention of a carnotaurus that-"
Lew Dodgson butted in. "Could we focus on the problem at hand here? Look at that moron, Baselton, just standing there like an idiot. What the hell is going to happen to my god damn t-rex, Richard?"
Dr. Levine looked out at George as he stood in petrification, and Stella, standing beside him, slowly wagging her tail in what seemed to be a pleasant manner.
"It's anyones guess, Mr. Dodgson. Rebirtha may simply be curious. It's likely she heard Stella's cries of distress and came to see what was going on. Rebirtha might simply move on." Dr. Levine paused. "There is a small chance perhaps that she may take the little one under her wing, or…"
"Or what, Richard?" Dodgson was unsettled by her tone.
"If Rebirtha doesn't simply move along I suspect a greater chance that Stella will be eaten to avoid competition later on." Dr. Levine added a moment later, "she'll likely eat Mr. Baselton as well."
"I don't give a shit about George. We have to protect that asset!" Dodgson jabbed an index finger out at Stella. "Now how the hell are we going to do that, Richard?"
Dr. Levine had a sly undertone. "You could go out there and get it."
"Hell," Dodgson grumbled.
"Shouldn't somebody go get George?" Arby said.
"You first, Arby," Diego almost muttered his words. He was staring off at the tree line where Rebirtha was beginning to emerge.
"Holy shit." The sight of the tyrannosaur took Kelly's breath away.
Branches rustled and snapped, and Rebirtha's giant snout came through the foliage preceding the rest of her head and neck. She turned towards Stella with a low purr and sniffed the air.
Stella looked up at her, and they seemed to regard each other. Rebirtha's attitude appeared passive and indifferent. Stella on the other hand was more eager, like a small pet expecting to be fed. The little t-rex took a few small steps toward the adult, and the pole slipped from George's hand. George remained petrified.
Rebirtha huffed with disinterest and turned toward the nearer of the two Chinooks in which no one was hiding. With a grunt she lumbered out of the trees and moved toward the helicopter, exposing her full body to view.
"Magnificent," Dr. Levine watched in awe. "Look how she moves!"
Beside her Kelly was nodding excitedly. Arby and Diego were standing with their jaws dropped. Dodgson and King were shifting with uneasy looks as were Reuben and Sparrow.
Rebirtha strode over to the front rotor of the Chinook and paused to sniff it. Crinkling her nose she tried to scratch her snout on one of the blades, and became frustrated when it rotated away from her. She tried again, only to push the blade further from her. Then she got a surprise as the next blade back came around and bumped her in the back of the head. Rebirtha snapped around, barked at it, and then bit onto the rotor.
Between the two pickup trucks Smith sprang up ready to fire his pistol at the tyrannosaurus.
Thorne promptly yanked him back down. "Are you insane?"
"Man, that big lizard is about to bust up our chopper!"
"And you think your little pea shooter is gonna stop it?"
Smith looked down at his hand gun. He felt silly. He knew Thorne was right. "What the hell are we gonna do then?"
"Nothing, man. Nothing. That shit is like a ten tonne grizzly bear."
There was a loud snap, and both men looked through the truck windows at the Chinook. The rotor blade was in the tyrannosaur's mouth.
"Shit," Smith shook his head. "God damn it, Thorne. You better hope it don't go after the other chopper, or we're stuck here, man."
Rebirtha spit out the rotor blade with a coughing sound and then leaned her whole body in against the fuselage of the helicopter. With shifting motions she grunted and scratched her hide.
In the other Chinook Reuben was watching the dinosaur with dismay. "That corpulent bastard is wrecking our transportation!" He listened to his watch for a moment and then gave it a frustrated glare. "No, we don't have any dynamite!" Reuben turned to Sparrow and saw that she was chewing on one of the Lik-A-Stix from a Fun Dip packet. He slapped her forearm and said, "will you stop it with the confectioneries! We need to think of a plan."
King chimed in, "we should be getting the hell out of here."
Reuben pointed at him. "I don't like you, but I agree with you."
"We're not leaving," Dodgson growled.
Outside the helicopter Stellla was barking at Rebirtha while keeping a respectable distance. In between barks she would sometimes whimper and cry at the adult.
Rebirtha looked over at the little rex lazily, finished scratching her hide, and uprighted. She ambled around the helicopter, being in no rush to walk over to Stella's location. Partway there the adult paused and looked toward the two trucks where Thorne and Smith were hiding. The adult rex sniffed the air and appeared to be contemplating a change of course.
Smith and Thorne looked at each other with worry. They saw her drawing in big breaths of air from their direction. They did not know anything about the nature of the creature they were dealing with, but it was obvious just by looking at her that Rebirtha was a carnivore. Both men looked down at the bloody rag around Thorne's ankle and then exchanged glances with even greater worry in their eyes.
"Shit," Smith mouthed.
They both looked back at Rebirtha, being ever so careful not to make any sudden moves or protrude beyond the cab of the truck. Rebirtha sniffed the air a few more times, trilled quietly, and then turned her head back toward Stella. With a grunt the adult rex moved in that direction.
Thorne and Smith issued silent sighs of relief.
With heavy feet Rebirtha thundered over the baby t-rex even moving as passively as she was. She halted above her and towered with great power. Rebirtha angled her snout down at Stella and observed her with scrutiny. The little rex took a few subtle steps back and dipped its head. A tiny cry of anxiousness escaped her as she bowed before the great adult.
"This may be shaping up to be a grim outcome for Stella," Dr. Levine said softly.
Arby and Kelly exchanged glances and kept watching.
Rebirtha's teeth spread wide, and she lowered her head toward the baby rex. Stella cowered but did not run. Rebirtha moved her jaws over the little one in such a way that Stella was now obscured. The adult rex clamped her teeth, and there was a short little scream followed by a crunch.
"Oh dear," Dr. Levine said.