by catt dahman
Unfortunately, in those places, the strong reptilian scent clung to the mud, and the sharp twang of urine’s ammonia stung the contestants’ eyes. Jack wrinkled his nose, “Let’s get water a little way farther along.”
When they found a spot that had a wide waterway with deeper spots and a white froth running over rocks, the teams replenished their water supplies after they had eaten protein bars and fruit and had drunk deeply from their canteens. It was a good place for them to rinse off as well to cool off; it was pleasant for even soothing bruises and scratches.
Ruby and Lawryn yanked off their clothing, leaving on only their bras and panties, and without any embarrassment, they waded into the stream with bars of soap and sank beneath the flowing water to the necks. It felt wonderful.
After the first two cooled off and took up arms again, Susan, Wendy, and Serinda washed off. A few of the others raised eyebrows when Jeremy waded out in boxers, but he chuckled dryly, “I have my soap. When you don’t have infections and painful feet, you’ll be glad you followed my lead. And make sure you use the bug repellent and sun screen again.”
“I smell better,” Susan said, “those things stink.” She glanced at Jeremy and then at Jack and blushed. Both were handsome men and half naked. When Brent went in to bathe, the women turned away uninterested and found tasks to stay busy. Ruby whispered to Susan how she noticed that, and both giggled.
“Some are cuter,” Susan said, her face going pink.
“Why, Susan! I think you have a crush,” Ruby whispered.
“I don’t. Shhh,” Susan begged. She turned away. “You hanging in here, Kathleen?” Susan asked, checking the bandages.
“Best I can. I never imagined pain like this. Feels like glass grinding around when I put weight on my leg. Guess it is cracked. Sorry I’ve been a bitch. I don’t think I’m going to make it, guys, and I am slowing you down.”
“Hush. We’ll get there. Don’t talk that way,” Marcus said.
“Nothing we can do,” Susan said, patting Kathleen on the shoulder.
“I never imagined pain like this,” Kathleen said. “I’m not gonna make it.”
They moved off again, feeling the loss of the safe spot as a weight on their shoulders. It was nice there and cooler with the trees so tall and full that they blocked all the sunlight and made the woods almost magical as it was filtered a soft green.
As the group passed an open area, they felt watched. Little sounds reached them as sticks snapped and leave rustled.
The entourage of small compys fled back down the trail, snickering and clicking their mouths with fear. In Ruby’s pocket, John crawled in deeper.
“What are they?”
“Troodons,” Ruby said; she had memorized the booklet.
“Meat or veggie?” Jack asked.
“Both,” Ruby watched them. They were no taller than her waist but twice as long as they were tall. Muscular tails flicked and twitched as the creatures stopped eating berries to watch the newcomers. Pale green, they blended with the foliage, and their lower jaws were stained purple with juices. Little button eyes rolled as they looked at the humans with curiosity. Maybe they would stay with the berries.
The group moved slowly, watching the creatures. The one closest to them blinked, and the sickle-shaped claw on his foot raised, flicked, and elevated a little more. The creatures smelled fear, and they smelled blood; Kathleen and Donovan’s wounds were like ringing a dinner bell as their instincts told them there was injured prey close and that was often meant easy kill. The troodons didn’t sense, smell, or see a menace as they would with a larger, clawed creature or a horned beast.
Had the contestants known the way troodons processed information with small brains, they might have gathered into a close, larger bunch to make themselves look larger or jabbed weapons to mimic horns, but that information was not available to those who lived sixty-five million years after troodons.
There was no time to think as the dinosaurs came at the contestants; the animals ran gracefully, like a pale green cloud along the trees and ferns and were impossible to watch as they swarmed.
“Up the hill,” Jack yelled.
Ruby fired her gun and knocked one off its feet; it was wounded or dying, thrashing, trying to get to her, snapping its jaws and shrieking angrily. Terrified, John shrieked from her pocket. Ruby watched as everyone fought, and Jack yelled to them to climb, but she felt as if she were underwater, moving slowly and watching the action unravel. Ruby pulled at each person as he crawled up, fighting the pack of troodons.
She was confused and shocked when an arm came flying as she pulled; it was detached, dripping fresh blood, ragged at the end, and covered with ants and flies. Screaming, she tossed it. She was disgusted that it was warm.
Brent grabbed Traci, pulled her along, and followed Jack and Marcus. At the top of the hill, the men fired down, trying to keep the creatures from following. Jeremy and Adrian fought back, and Serinda fired the revolver empty but got a killing shot; however, they were no matches for the pack of animals.
Kathleen went down, rolled towards the water and soaked herself as an enormous, heavy troodon tackled her. Three scrapped over her, snapping and biting, and used their back, wickedly sharp claws to slash as she screamed. She scuttled into the water, thinking a deeper pool might keep them off her, but they wrenched her back to the dry ground. Dimly, she saw Ruby try to get back to her, but the vicious animals blocked her between them. Ruby fell and then scrambled back up.
Adrian barreled into Ruby just in time and swept her up the hill.
“Climb,” a voice called.
Calmly, Jeremy fired, taking out two more of the creatures that made crazed leaps where Ruby was standing just a split second before. He had saved her by microseconds with his deadly aim and some good fortune.
Ruby let Adrian yank her to the top of the hill. Jack took her arm and pushed her against rocks, yelling at her to climb; she obeyed, unsure where she was or what she was doing. Her head spun.
As she climbed, the rocks scraped her fingerless gloves and rubbed her fingertips painfully raw, but she didn’t stop crawling; she leaped to higher rocks, pulled herself upwards, and raised her boots high as hands pulled her upwards. She was running automatically, not even thinking beyond climbing and leaving the monsters behind.
Jack looked into her face and shook his head. He said something, but it made no sense at all. His words swirled around her head like flies. Ruby leaned over and vomited, feeling as if she drank too much alcohol and was sick from it. Her stomach lurched, and she covered a rock in her vomit.
The rocks whirled around her. Someone called her name, and Ruby gave up. She couldn’t hang on anymore. Her head throbbed.
She allowed the darkness to claim her and fell softly into nothingness.
Chapter Seven: The Rocks
Ruby awoke in darkness, comfortable, warm, and cozy, but somewhere around her shoulder, a rock bothered her as it poked, and she wiggled to get away from it. She wondered if she were blind but wasn’t worried. She figured she wasn’t blind since she noted a fire flaming with gold and orange sparks.
There was Lawryn, looking at her with a worried frown.
“Hi.”
“Hi, Ruby,” said Lawryn as she looked a little confused. “She’s awake.”
“Yep,” Ruby agreed.
“How do you feel?” Jack asked.
Ruby considered that, “A rock is poking me, it’s dark, and my head hurts badly. I don’t feel very well.”
Jack chuckled dryly, “That’s good, I think. Ruby, you hit your head in the fight and took a nasty gash. We cleaned the wound really, really well, put ointment on the wound, and bandaged it. That’s why you got sick and passed out. That and shock probably. If you had passed out sooner, we would’ve lost you,” Jack told her.
“Why’s it dark?”
“It’s night. You were conked out a long time, your breathing was fine, and your heartbeat was fine, so we waited to see if you woke. I mean we waited
for when you did,” Lawryn said, helping Ruby to take tiny sips of water.
“John?”
“He’s fine. He’s in my pocket if that’s okay?” Jack wiggled a finger until the tiny compy peeked out of his pocket and chittered as he saw Ruby. He wanted to go to her. Sighing, Jack settled the little creature onto Ruby’s arm and watched John crawl into her pocket again where he snuggled, looking at Ruby in a possessive manner that made Jack chuckle, “He likes you.”
“I like him. Thanks for looking after him.”
“He pooped in my pocket.”
“Hmm. He never did that to me,” Ruby said.
She lay there a while resting and allowed Lawryn to help her sit. They had food, and she managed to eat a little and drink more water, feeding her pet as she fed herself very slowly. Her friends had had time to recover from the attack, but she was still terrified.
“They can’t get us,” Jack said.
“We’re really safe here?”
“Yes, I promise.”
“Did all of us make it? Jack, I found an arm. It wasn’t connected to anyone.” Tears poured down her cheeks as she remembered that part.
Jack sat back and rubbed his eyes.
“It’s bad, isn’t it?” Ruby asked.
“We survived because we had some help as we climbed the rocks. The blue team was here, chased by T-Rex,” he explained. Unfortunately, before the blue team ran into the marauding pair, they ran into a juvenile T-Rex that killed one of their team members. While five of the dinos chased them around rocks, the team members climbed, but several were picked off the rocks and torn apart. Their blood slicked a side of the bluff.
“They said one ran away, so that must be whom you found, I mean the arm; the troodons got him, too,” Jack said.
“Oh,” Ruby frowned, touching her head again.
Lawryn knelt again, “Ruby, the gash was real close to the little camera….”
When the micro-cameras were inserted, they felt like less than a tiny pimple and healed within a few days. The audience could see when the contestants could see and hear; the cameras were very small bits of technology that allowed everyone to be a part of the experience.
“And?”
“And it was a tiny dot, and well, I removed it,” Lawryn said.
Ruby laughed. They looked at her strangely, but she couldn’t stop laughing. She no longer had a camera, so she could be just Ruby, now, “Good, I am glad I got hurt; let them wonder. I didn’t like them seeing as I see. Let them eat cake.”
Jack nodded with a slight smile. He looked worried about Ruby, but she knew what she said didn’t make sense and was giddy with relief.
“What else?” Ruby stopped laughing and asked.
“Blue team is left with three people: Mali, Preston, and Anthony,” he whispered. “They don’t like Preston because he’s a total prick. They’ve told plenty of stories about his being a jerk.”
“I see.” Ruby waited for the bad news. They were putting off telling her the bad news, and that concerned her. She tried to think beyond her aching head. Susan handed her a couple of aspirins, which she chewed, enjoying the bitter, sour taste and hoping they worked quickly.
“Kathleen didn’t make it,” Jack said.
Close by, Jeremy sighed heavily. He knew Jack shouldn’t tell Ruby some things yet, but he wished he could have missed hearing all of it, as well. He felt envy for the unknown, a blank in memory, and a desire for what he had seen and heard to vanish from his mind.
Kathleen was tough and a fighter: she had fought the T-Rex and survived. She had her knife, and she fought the trio of troodons who nipped and clawed at her, roaring each time their knife-life claws cut through her clothing and flesh. They enjoyed the fight since they didn’t often find prey they could attack with the full pack and win.
She sliced one’s leg off and smashed the face of another, but there were others to take the places of each she killed. Adrian and Jeremy fought them, but the pack stalked the men back up the hill and seemingly were everywhere, swarming; it was the only way they could hunt properly.
Adrian and Jeremy had a split second decision to make. They could either fight the dinosaurs attacking Kathleen, who was mortally wounded, or they could race up the hill and drag Ruby to safety.
Once Ruby got to Jack, Adrian climbed like an automaton.
Jack and Marcus pulled people to safety and shot at the creatures as the people on top of the rocks helped them. Jeremy shot from the ground, protecting his team as they waited to climb upwards and out of danger.
Lawryn was up first followed by Wendy and Serinda. Being up there and safe was good, but they watched their friends who were running and felt helpless; they just yelled directions and support and hoped for the best.
“Stupid Brent, he really did try this time. He tried to get Traci up the rocks, but he wasn’t a climber, and she didn’t or couldn’t do anything to help. She was worse than you, Ruby. You climbed robotically but on your own. Traci had to be pushed up, and sometimes she held on, but her feet had to be placed, so he climbed and pulled her along,” Lawryn said.
Jack nodded. “Then she went limp if you can believe and just slid off the rocks into a jagged section; I don’t think she cared. She was done. Brent made a grab for her, but he fell.” After Traci fell onto the rocks below, she never moved nor ever made another sound; she was dead.
“They fell, and they…well…the monsters didn’t get them; I think the fall killed them.”
Jack didn’t add how long they had heard Kathleen struggling until the pack finished her. He also didn’t add that Brent was forced to give up on Traci since he became more exhausted; she fell, and as he tried to go on, he reached and fell.
Brent flipped and bounced on the way down, sliding and plummeting, and then he landed on an outcropping of rocks and broke his back, yet the fall didn’t kill him. He screamed as his back arched over a hard bulge of shale.
Jack and Adrian went to him as Jeremy climbed up to Brent and away from the dinosaurs chasing him. The men tried to help Brent up, but he screamed when they tried to move him; he said he couldn’t feel or move his legs. He grabbed at their hands and cried, “Don’t leave me. I’m scared. Why can’t I feel my legs?”
“I’m here, Brent, hang on,” Jack said.
Brent wasn’t cocky anymore but was like some lost kid who was in pain and scared. He wept.
Brent wet himself, and his bowels evacuated; he cried more with shame when he realized it. Had he not smelled himself, he wouldn’t have known since he couldn’t feel the discomfort of his pants. One of his arms was fractured in several places and looked like a broken twig. He stared at the bones sticking out of the flesh from purple gashes; he cried bitterly, seeming young and looking very afraid. He held his arm close to his chest and cried, unashamed of his tears.
“I hurt,” Brent said, pitifully, as blood soaked his chest. He knew he was injured and was in pain, but while he could see his ruined arm, the blood pouring from it, and the bones sticking out, his nerves were in shock, so he was saved from at least half of the pain. He didn’t understand how terribly wounded he really was.
Later, Jack sat on the rock and wept for the kid. Right then, he stared blankly, unsure what to do in the face of abject misery and terror. There was no place to pat the kid since either the kid couldn’t feel any touch below the chest, or his other bones were shattered like his other arm and collarbone. On the other hand, broken fingers stuck out in all directions. His shirt was torn, and everywhere he had skin, the flesh was bruised and scraped. Even his face was tattered and bleeding.
After a while, Jack climbed came back up, and Marcus and Adrian patted his back as they talked over the situation, wondering what to do for Brent. No one could guess where the patching up of Brent would begin, and no one knew what to do with a broken back unless someone pulled him on a travois that they didn’t have. They could use paracords to try to pull Brent up, but the pain would be unreal, and he still was bleeding badly from a dozen places;
together the blood loss and shock would kill him.
“I can’t watch him die slowly,” Marcus said, “and it’s killing me. I can stand dying if I have to, but not watching someone tortured like this. Man, I thought I was coming on the show: smile, look good, get to the finish, and win...didn’t expect all this.”
“I didn’t realize we would watch this,” Adrian admitted, “but the f-ing audience loves it. Ratings are all that matter.” He spat.
“I hate the audience. Yeah, I said it. You heard me, you freaks. Dance on our graves, and mark me as most hated. Screw you all,” Marcus said to the audience via the cameras. He nodded to Adrian.
Jeremy vanished for a few minutes, and when he came back, Brent no longer bawled and whimpered for help. He was silent; Jeremy’s eyes betrayed a deep despair of his own.
Jack met Jeremy’s eyes, and Jack understood about Brielle as well; he tried to thank the other man, but his vision blurred with tears, “It shouldn’t have to be you. It’s not fair. Twice. That sucks.”
“I know, but it is me. Let’s be glad I am able to let them go,” Jeremy said. He checked on everyone, gently covering Susan and pausing next to her. Then he sat and stared into the fire as they ate, tended to the wounded, and waited and hoped Ruby would awaken. His eyes were deeply haunted with what he felt was his duty. He felt dulled.
“Sucks, I know.”
“Eh, yeah, but then you run across an old building falling in with no heat or water. You find little bitty kids bundled up in dirty rags. They’re sick and can’t get any medicine at all, and that’s the best housing they can get. They’re thin, starving, and dying slowly…got sores all over them, have fleas, lice…some are barely conscious…just suffering. And you have to decide to walk away and remember that forever, or you have to let them go in peace….”
“Angel of Death. I don’t mean that mean,” Lawryn mused. “I feel sympathy for you.”
Jeremy shrugged, “My favorite thing to do is read. Yeah, that’s weird, but I love books. I like Norse Mythology.”
“What part?” Lawryn asked.
