Tamer- King of Dinosaurs 5

by Michael-Scott Earle

  “You don’t need to do that.” I forced my lips to smile at her as I simultaneously pushed the image of her being tied in the hut out of my mind.

  Fuck those assholes. I hope they burn in whatever hell they ended up in.

  The sun crept lower in the sky, and we came to the hillside which separated the massive valley from the next segment. The river was growing wider and beginning to slow its speed significantly. I guessed that it was a good five hundred yards where the hills formed their bottleneck, and when we turned around the corner, I saw that the river on the other side was spreading even more water.

  There were trees growing out of the middle of the river a mile or two downstream, and the smell of the water had changed from a clean mossy scent to one of rotten eggs. The sour smell wasn’t that strong yet, but it was obvious that we were getting close to where the river turned into a marsh.

  “Gee, you’ll probably want to stay out of the water here,” I said as I pointed downriver. The fire-woman was walking waist deep in the river, and the water was starting to turn an opaque green color.

  “I’ll be fine,” she said. “I’m too hot for these creatures to eat.

  “If you are in the water, you’ll be cool,” I said. “This kind of slow moving deep water has all sorts of hungry dinosaurs in it. They won’t think twice about eating you.”

  “The water isn’t very deep here,” she said with a shrug, but then she gasped when she saw Grumpy roll his back to the surface of the water twenty feet ahead of her. “Did you see that?”

  “Yeah,” I said as the onyx-skinned woman jumped out of the river. “Don’t worry about him. He’s with me.”

  “He is?” both women said at the same time as they turned to me.

  “Yeah,” I said with a shrug. “He doesn’t like to get out of the water, but there might be bigger dinosaurs than him in there, so he may have to.”

  “Bigger than him?” Tannin asked, and her eyes opened as wide as an ocean.

  “You just saw part of his tail,” I laughed, and I noticed Gee move farther away from the edge of the river. I half expected her to ask me why I had never shown him to her before, but she either didn’t think of it, or she guessed why I hadn’t told her.

  We continued on the side of the still flowing river, but I could see that the water was about to push up to the sides of the hills along the beach. For what I guessed was a quarter of a mile, it was marshland at the foot of the slope, but then the hills angled to the right a bit, and I couldn’t see if the beach came back after.

  “Okay,” I said as I looked up at the sun. “Looks like we have maybe two more hours before sunset. We can go back to the previous valley and camp or try to circumnavigate the marsh by climbing over the hills, or we can try to ford across the water right here. I still don’t really know how far away we are from the ocean, so we might round that hillside and still have another mile of the marsh to go.”

  “I can hear it,” Tannin said as she turned her head a bit.

  “The ocean?” I asked.

  “Yes.” She nodded and smiled at me. “It sounds lovely, and not that far away.”

  “How deep will the water be by this hillside?” Gee asked as she gestured to the spot where I was thinking about pushing the stegos. “I can’t really see through the water. Can these three swim?”

  “They aren’t really made for swimming,” I said as I glanced down at Mike D’s feet, “but I can get them to paddle for short distances.” I looked at the trees growing out of the river. I doubted the roots could run that deep, but I did kind of fear some sort of crazy monster lurking under the surface of the river, but I doubted that anything could chomp and kill one of the stegos.

  Unless a giant shark, crocodile larger than Grumpy, or spinosaurus was swimming under the surface.

  “We’ll hug the hillside as close as we can,” I said as I ordered the stegos to move forward.

  Mike D, MCA, and Ad-Rock didn’t really like the idea, but they moved into the green river water, and I instructed Grumpy to swim to the right side of us just in case something decided to come this way.

  “I can climb up here,” Gee said as she leapt up on to the side of the rocky hillside. “Better than swimming.”

  “Agreed,” I said, and then Tannin and I gasped as Mike D seemed to lose his footing. The sensation only lasted a second, and then the stego was walking again.

  But the water was up past their bellies, and the three of them had to hold their heads up.

  “Please don’t get any deeper,” I prayed as I looked out across the river. I also should have prayed that the four spinos wouldn’t return, or that there wasn’t anything horrific in the water, but I realized we weren’t even out into the main marsh area yet. We were still really in the river, and I suspected that things would get more dangerous as soon as we rounded the hill corner.

  “Looks like that’s the deepest it goes,” Gee said after we had walked for a minute or two through the water, and I glanced over to see the fire-woman climbing along the slope of the hill with a practiced ease. Every time she touched a rock, it sizzled, and the few shrubs growing out of the slope withered and smoked when she passed them.

  “Yeah,” I said with a grateful sigh. “Actually looks like it is getting a bit shallower.”

  “We are almost to the turn,” Tannin said, and I angled the stegos toward a shelf on the hillside that looked big enough for them all to stand on.

  Mike D was carrying Tannin and I, and the stego had no problem getting up on the shelf. Neither did MCA, but Ad-Rock was carrying all of our tools and the malachite. He managed to get his front feet up on the muddy ledge, but then he couldn’t get his back legs up.

  There was thrashing in the water behind him, and I felt my stomach jump into my throat, but then the stego popped up on the ledge. Ad-Rock turned his neck around so that he could look behind him, and Grumpy’s head came to the surface. The giant croc let out an annoyed rumble, and he turned his massive yellow eyes up to me.

  “By the fire, how big is that creature?” Gee gasped. “His head looks twice as long as me!”

  “He’s big,” I said. “Thanks, for pushing Ad-Rock up, Grumpy.”

  The purussaurus let out another rumble of indignation, and then his face sunk beneath the water. I was a bit surprised that he’s come to Ad-Rock’s aid, since I hadn’t commanded him, but I figured that Grumpy was going to do whatever the fuck Grumpy was going to do, and I should just be thankful that he was hanging out with us.

  I turned my attention back to the west and surveyed our route. The water was now definitely a marsh instead of a river, and I could see the ocean about two miles in the distance. I couldn’t really make out the sand of the beach, but I knew we were close.

  Now I just had to figure out how to get there.

  The hillside to our right bent back sharply to the south, so it might have been okay to follow, but the water there lacked any of the trees or small grass platforms that the other parts of the marsh did. I guessed this was because the water was deeper, and while I knew I could make the stegos swim a bit, it would probably be dangerous and slow going.

  The route that looked like it required less swimming was one that angled at our eleven o’clock. A group of grass, fern, and tree islands seemed to indicate the route was closer to the surface of the water, so I reasoned that the stegos would be able to walk most of the way.

  “We are going to cut across there,” I said as I pointed to the line of small grass islands.

  “Uhhh, Victor,” Gee said as she pointed to our north, and I twisted my neck around to see what she was looking at.

  About a half mile to our north the four spinos were feasting on the corpse of what looked like a brachiosaurus. I knew that the brachio was one of the largest dinos to have ever lived, but the corpse of the dino didn’t seem that large next to the spinos that were tearing into its body.

  “They are busy eating,” I hissed. “We need to move quickly though. Even with full bellies, they might decide
to chase after us.”

  “How do you want me to do this?” Gee said as she gestured up to her hair.

  “Hmmm,” I said as I glanced back at the cliff walls behind her. “Can you keep climbing on the cliff and make your way around to the beach? If you follow us across the marsh, you might burn it behind us.

  “I’d rather not leave you,” she said as she shook her head.

  “In love with me already?” I laughed.

  “Maybe,” she said as she winked at me. “Let me climb up higher on this hill, so I can see farther.”

  “Good idea,” I said as I glanced up at Bruce circling above us.

  Gee made a few Spiderman style jumps up the steeper parts of the hill side, and when she was about to the top of the crest, she turned around and stared west for a few moments.

  “It’s maybe half a mile until the beach,” she said, and then she looked south. “The cliffs wrap around maybe a quarter of a mile to the beach. If you can make your dinosaurs swim, this is the shortest distance out of the marsh.”

  “I don’t want them to swim too much,” I said. “Take the cliffs and meet us at the beach when we get out.”

  “Will do,” Gee said, and then she started to traverse the side of the hill.

  “Ready?” I asked Tannin.

  “Yes,” she said with a grimace.

  Then I nodded and commanded Mike D to step off the ledge and onto the first grassy island.

  Chapter 8

  I thought the stegos would end up swimming a bit, but I’d been correct about the height of the land under the grass. Mike D still seemed to sink a bit when he put his feet through the marsh grasses, but the green water only came up above his toes. There was a ten-foot gap between the first island and the next, but he was able to step across it without stumbling.

  I kept my eyes on the feasting spinos north of us, but I checked to make sure that Ad-Rock had made it to the first island when we reached the third. He seemed to be doing fine, so I commanded the trio to keep going across the marsh.

  We made it a hundred and fifty, maybe two hundred yards without issue, when all of a sudden I heard a massive roar from our north. I had just looked away from the spinos to check on Ad-Rock, so I whipped my head around back to the north. The spinos were circling around the corpse of the brachiosaurus toward the north, and I saw what looked like a group of a dozen or so other large predators.

  “What are they doing?” Tannin gasped.

  “I dunno,” I replied as I tried to lean over Mike D’s plates so I could see around the body of the brachiosaurus. The newcomers looked like allosauruses, and even though they were massive predators, each of them only looked about half the size of the spinos.

  But a rough count gave me fifteen allosauruses to the spinos’ four.

  “Fuck, they are going to rumble,” I said.

  “Fight?” Tannin asked.

  “Yeah,” I answered, “but that’s not a badass enough word for it. The ones with the fin on their back are giant and mean, but the smaller ones are really smart. They wouldn’t attack if they didn’t think they could win.”

  The largest spino let out a colossal roar, and even though he must have been a mile away, the water of the marsh seemed to vibrate. The allosauruses had formed a semi-circle around the spinos, and they all echoed the spino’s roar at the same time.

  Then they went at each other.

  I had expected the group of allosauruses to split up evenly and attack each of the spinos at the same time, but they surprised me when one half of the semi-circle targeted the smallest of the spinos while the other half went after the second smallest. The allosauruses bit into the first spino’s fin, arms, tail, and neck. The spino actually managed to get a bite on one of its attackers, but there were just too many of the smaller dinos on him or her, and it fell to its knees under the weight of the sudden attack.

  It was the same situation for the second smallest of the spinos, but the larger two spinos only waited a fraction of a second before they began to chew into the bodies of the allosauruses that were attacking their friends.

  There was just a shitload of the allosaurus hanging on the two spinos, but each time one of the larger spinos bit, one of the allosauruses got their throats ripped open and their corpses were flung away by the larger dino.

  It was hard to get a good view of the fight because of the distance and the corpse of the brachiosaurus, but it was clear to me that the two smaller spinos were going to die. The larger spinos just weren’t pulling the allosaurus off quickly enough, and there were too many of the smaller apex predators.

  Then the allosauruses suddenly dispersed and seemed to run away from the two spinos they were attacking. It looked like the smaller one was definitely dead, but the second smallest was really injured, and it didn’t look like it was able to use its back legs. Five of the allosauruses were prone on the ground, but the rest of the group reformed their lines to the north, and the spinos exchanged roars with their attackers as the groups squared off again.

  “Those allosaurus must be really hungry,” I said as I tried to ignore the panic racing of my heart. “This seems like a desperate attack.”

  “It seems like they might win, though,” Tannin said.

  “But they lost some of their group. They knew they would. The larger dinosaurs with the fins are no joke. They would have been better off attacking something smaller.” As I spoke, I saw one of the allosauruses dart forward at the largest of the spinos, but as the larger predator moved to snap at them, the allosaurus twisted away, and another of his smaller buddies moved forward to attack the spino’s unprotected flank. The big spino was a beast though, and he twisted around and almost caught the new attacker in his jaws.

  “Something is wrong,” I said, as my stomach began to ice over.

  “It is a terrible battle,” Tannin sighed. “So much violen--”

  “No, not that,” I said. “The allosauruses are smart, but this is a little too smart.”

  “What do you mean?” she asked.

  “I dunno what I mean exactly,” I hissed, “but I need to focus on getting us out of here.” I turned back around to watch where Mike D was heading, and I ordered the stegos to increase their pace.

  Was there someone like me controlling the allosaurs? Or had they just gotten smarter because they were in a large group?

  I thought about the green feathered deinonychus raptors that had harassed us when we first built our fort. They had made coordinated attacks against us, but when I had killed their leader, the group seemed to turn into a bunch of idiots and quickly dispersed. Could the larger predators also have some sort of advanced pack intelligence?

  Mike D lost his front footing, and he slid into the water between an island with a startled song. Tannin let out a gasp as we lurched forward, and I caught her arm before she could slip forward into the water. For half a second, I thought we were in trouble, but the stego quickly got his front feet on the next patch of high ground, and he was able to kick his back legs into the water and get himself up.

  We were about halfway there.

  I turned to the north and saw that the allosauruses were now down to four against the last spino. The big guy looked pretty fucked up, but the smaller attackers didn’t look so sure of themselves as they paced back and forth in front of him. I wondered if they were trying to look for a perfect time to attack, then I noticed that the spino was bleeding really bad at his left flank, and I thought that maybe the allosauruses were waiting for him to bleed out before they attacked.

  As I watched, the spino darted forward and closed his maw around the face of one of the allosauruses. The other three moved to attack, and one of them managed to clamp down on the spino’s left leg. The battle evolved into a tumble of teeth, claws, and roars, but Mike D lurched a bit as he tried to get to the next island, and I turned back to help guide him, MCA, and Ad-Rock.

  The next island in the marsh was the largest we had encountered yet, and all three of the stegos were able to fit on it.
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  I turned back to the north in time to see the lone surviving spino roar after two fleeing allosauruses. The sight was a bit astounding, and I let out a long sigh when I saw the hundreds of bleeding cuts and teeth marks on the side of the massive predator. Spinosauruses were supposed to be more badass than even T-Rexes, but I hadn’t expected any of them to survive a battle against all those allosauruses. It was fucking crazy, and I didn’t know if I should cheer for the spino or be more terrified that the guy had won.

  The spino hadn’t won easily though. The other three who I guessed were his family were laying still on the sand amongst all the allosaurus corpses, and the big predator moved over to sniff the next largest one that lay beside him. Then he let out a roar that seemed to be filled with emotion.

  “Almost there!” Gee shouted, and I turned back to our destination to see the fire-woman standing on the sandy shore some sixty yards ahead of us. Relief filled my stomach as soon as the stegos were all up on the sand, and then I gave the order for them to trot south. I didn’t think the spino was going to be a problem, but I still wanted to get as far away from him as I could.

  Running the stegos on the beach was much more enjoyable than riding them across the uneven surfaces in the marsh, and I angled the trio so that we were riding across the wet sand beside the water so that Mike D, MCA, and Ad-Rock had firmer ground. Being closer to the ocean also let Grumpy keep somewhat of a pace with us, but he had to make his way through the marsh and then around in the ocean, so we outpaced him for the first ten minutes of our escape.

  Gee was a surprisingly quick runner, and she kept pace beside the stegos easily. She ran on our right, and her feet sizzled when the waves rolled in and caused her path to be covered by ankle deep water. She stared into the ocean the entire time we ran, and she didn’t look away until I slowed us all down for a break about half an hour after we had left the marsh.

  “It is amazing!” Gee said as she pointed to the ocean and kicked at the water. “I can’t believe it!”