Dinosaurs II

by Gardner Dozoi

  Forward, thought Cohen. Forward!

  The beast’s body felt different. Its belly was full to bursting.

  Forward!

  With ponderous steps, the rex began to march.

  It was wonderful. To be in control again! Cohen felt the old thrill of the hunt.

  And he knew exactly what he was looking for.

  ###

  “Judge Hoskins says okay,” said Axworthy. “She’s authorized for you to be transferred into that new T. rex they’ve got right here in Alberta at the Tyrrell. It’s a young adult, they say. Judging by the way the skeleton was found, the rex died falling, probably into a fissure. Both legs and the back were broken, but the skeleton remained almost completely articulated, suggesting that scavengers couldn’t get at it. Unfortunately, the chronotransference people say that back-propagating that far into the past they can only plug you in a few hours before the accident occurred. But you’ll get your wish: you’re going to die as a tyrannosaur. Oh, and here are the books you asked for: a complete library on Cretaceous flora and fauna. You should have time to get through it all; the chronotransference people will need a couple of weeks to set up.”

  ###

  As the prehistoric evening turned to night, Cohen found what he had been looking for, cowering in some underbrush: large brown eyes, long, drawn-out face, and a lithe body covered in fur that, to the tyrannosaur’s eyes, looked blue-brown.

  A mammal. But not just any mammal. Purgatorius, the very first primate, known from Montana and Alberta from right at the end of the Cretaceous. A little guy, only about ten centimeters long, excluding its ratlike tail. Rare creatures, these days. Only a precious few.

  The little furball could run quickly for its size, but a single step by the tyrannosaur equaled more than a hundred of the mammal’s. There was no way it could escape.

  The rex leaned in close, and Cohen saw the furball’s face, the nearest thing there would be to a human face for another sixty million years. The animal’s eyes went wide in terror.

  Naked, raw fear.

  Mammalian fear.

  Cohen saw the creature scream.

  Heard it scream.

  It was beautiful.

  The rex moved its gaping jaws in toward the little mammal, drawing in breath with such force that it sucked the creature into its maw. Normally the rex would swallow its meals whole, but Cohen prevented the beast from doing that. Instead, he simply had it stand still, with the little primate running around, terrified, inside the great cavern of the dinosaur’s mouth, banging into the giant teeth and great fleshy walls, and skittering over the massive, dry tongue.

  Cohen savored the terrified squealing. He wallowed in the sensation of the animal, mad with fear, moving inside that living prison.

  And at last, with a great, glorious release, Cohen put the animal out of its misery, allowing the rex to swallow it, the furball tickling as it slid down the giant’s throat.

  It was just like old times.

  Just like hunting humans.

  And then a wonderful thought occurred to Cohen. Why, if he killed enough of these little screaming balls of fur, they wouldn’t have any descendants. There wouldn’t ever be any Homo sapiens. In a very real sense, Cohen realized he was hunting humans—every single human being who would ever exist.

  Of course, a few hours wouldn’t be enough time to kill many of them. Judge Hoskins no doubt thought it was wonderfully poetic justice, or she wouldn’t have allowed the transfer: sending him back to fall into the pit, damned.

  Stupid judge. Why, now that he could control the beast, there was no way he was going to let it die young. He’d just—

  There it was. The fissure, a long gash in the earth, with a crumbling edge. Damn, it was hard to see. The shadows cast by neighboring trees made a confusing gridwork on the ground that obscured the ragged opening. No wonder the dull-witted rex had missed seeing it until it was too late.

  But not this time.

  Turn left, thought Cohen.

  Left.

  His rex obeyed.

  He’d avoid this particular area in future, just to be on the safe side. Besides, there was plenty of territory to cover. Fortunately, this was a young rex—a juvenile. There would be decades in which to continue his very special hunt. Cohen was sure that Axworthy knew his stuff: once it became apparent that the link had lasted longer than a few hours, he’d keep any attempt to pull the plug tied up in the courts for years.

  Cohen felt the old pressure building in himself, and in the rex. The tyrannosaur marched on.

  This was better than old times, he thought. Much better. Hunting all of humanity. The release would be wonderful.

  He watched intently for any sign of movement in the underbrush.

  THE VIRGIN AND THE DINOSAUR

  R. Garcia y Robertson

  A relatively new writer, R. Garcia y Robertson made his first sale in 1987, and since has become a frequent contributor to Asimov’s Science Fiction and The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction, as well as selling several stories to Amazing, Pulphouse, and Weird Tales. His first novel, The Spiral Dance, was published in 1991 to good critical response. Upcoming are two new novels, American Woman and The Virgin and the Dinosaur, and several of his recent stories have been optioned for the movies. He was born in Oakland, California, has a Ph.D. in the history of science and technology and, before becoming a full-time writer, taught those subjects at UCLA and Villanova. He lives in Mt. Vernon, Washington.

  In the vivid novella that follows, he takes us along with a bumbling team of time-traveling documentary filmmakers on location in the Upper Cretaceous, for an exciting and action-packed romp through history, complete with Zeppelins, Sioux warriors, haute cuisine, sex, hurricanes, and lots of dinosaurs, many of them hungry ones with great big teeth . . .

  * * *

  WELCOME to

  Hell Creek, Montana

  pop. 2

  Toothed and feathered proto-birds scurried on clawed wings into the upper branches; the screen of Mesozoic ferns and flowering trees parted. Jake Bento watched a tall, red-haired young woman step naked into the clearing—she moved from the shoulders and waist; bare athletic legs bunching, then releasing with each step.

  At that point-instant, Jake had Time by the tail. Five minutes before, he had navigated the Hell Creek portal perfectly, acing the coveted First Run with no nasty shocks. Microamps in his middle ear beat out an ancient victory anthem, “Light My Fire” by the Doors.

  “Isn’t it won-der-ful?” Peg rose on her toes, stretching in the steamy Montana air. Beads of sweat ran down between her breasts, across the swell of her belly, to gleam in her red triangle of pubic hair.

  Jake had bent down to do a reactor check. When he’d looked up, Peg had shucked blanket coat, buckskins, and moccasins. He grinned in appreciation. “Welcome to the fucking Mesozoic.”

  His mix of Universal and English puzzled Peg. Jake tuned down the Doors, reprogramming for full Universal. “Yes, undoubtedly essential. Premium quality.”

  “You make it sound like a meat substitute. What does ‘fucking’ mean?” Peg picked up the awe and reverence Jake packed into the English obscenity.

  “A verbal noun, indicating affection.” He dodged around the strict definition. “Intense personal affection.”

  “Well, then this whole fucking world is ours.” She swung her arms to indicate the ferns and dogwoods, the pool, the sky, the dry riverbed. Insects buzzed about.

  Just like Adam and Eve. Jake thought it, but did not say it. The absolute wonder of hitting that first point-instant in a new place had faded. Jake lived at the leading edge of FTL. He was the one who had brought them here. Peg was the neophyte, a raw first-timer, picked for this run because she happened to be young, healthy, ambitious, and over-qualified—Biotile rated her a dinosaur-genius. Only a beginner would lay claim to an entire world-era just because humans had finally arrived.

  Jake’s job was to play trusty guide and willing manservant—show memsahib the period, ha
ul her gear, bring her back intact. Rendering physical and personal assistance, as needed. Easy enough. The sort of assignment Jake could thrive on. Thousands of skilled and dedicated stay-at-homes had worked, sweated, and sacrificed so that he could share this clearing, this whole planet, with a criminally graceful Ph.D. in paleontology. He owed it to them to have fun.

  She followed his gaze, seeming to notice her body for the first time. “Sorry. My skin needed to breathe. It’s so incredibly hot.” Fahrenheit surface temperature had tripled since passing the portal. “You don’t mind, do you? We are adults.”

  “Mind? Not in the smallest.” Jake was wearing moccasins and fringed leggings, soft as gloves, and a cotton annuity shirt given to him by the River Crow, but he had nothing against nudity. Cretaceous Montana was made for it—mesothermic climate, no rude neighbors—none that cared anyway.

  However, he noted an alarming wholesomeness in the way Peg said “adults.” As if sex only took place between tipsy teenagers or incurable juveniles. There was no hard, fixed rule that team members had to fuck—but Jake expected it. With Peg, he put a priority on it. Five minutes into the job, she had shucked everything but her belly-button. Fabulous. But Peg probably just enjoyed the feel of warm air. The blending with nature. Her nudity was not meant for him.

  “So, when do we sight dinosaurs.” She swiveled on her toes like a dancer, trying to see over the foliage.

  “Say what?” He slipped back into English, still captivated by smallish breasts and large dark nipples.

  “Dinosaurs. Huge archosaurs. Dominant megafauna of this period. Where are they?”

  “Give them a moment.” Jake was moderately pleased not to have stepped out of the Hell Creek portal into the path of megafauna with big teeth and Bad Attitudes. A non-significant worry—the Mesozoic was a huge place; the very size of dinosaurs meant that they were rare, rarer than elk or rhino in a nature park. Navigating the Hell Creek anomaly had been infinitely more chancy. Jake had a private horror of portal skips—of just vanishing, leaving no clues, no clothes, nothing but the anomaly that ate you. With a dinosaur, at least you knew you were being devoured.

  So far, Upper Cretaceous Montana resembled pre-contact Australia. The pool he sat by might have been a South Kimberly billabong in the Dreamtime. Little creatures stirring the brush seemed no more dangerous than a goanna or a roo.

  “Come look.” Peg pushed aside a flowering branch. “We could have hit the wrong era—Lower Paleocene instead of the Uppermost Cretaceous. That would be devastating.” Hell Creek was the last stop for dinosaurs; in an eye-blink of geologic time, the huge creatures would be gone.

  Never doubting his navigation, Jake took the excuse to stand behind her, making concerned noises, inhaling her odor. Short copper curls tickled the nape of her neck. Sweat beaded at the base of her spine.

  The landscape was dull. Dense vegetation hugged the dry riverbed. The flats beyond were open canopy plains, hotter than a skillet, covered with scrub pines and thorny berry bushes. Peg must have made the mistake of trying to explore; Jake noted thin fresh scratches on her creamy hip.

  A thunderous buzzing shook the air. Streaking from the sand by the billabong, a vicious metal-blue insect homed straight for them. Peg leaped backward, twisting and slapping at the whirring horror. Jake’s shoulder holster slid a flat neural stunner into his palm. He yelped, “Drop.”

  Peg flattened on the sandy bank, and he fanned the air above her. The flying devil fell like a lead slug onto the wet sand. Peg pounced on the downed insect, prying open the jaws.

  “See here.” She waved the stunned bug beneath Jake’s nostrils. “Mandibles meant for dinosaur. Nothing in the Lowest Paleocene would take jaws like that to chew through.”

  He agreed. The saw-toothed dental work looked ferocious.

  Peg tossed the insect aside.

  By now, Jake knew the tone to take. Peg had worked herself into a paleontological frenzy just to get here. He had to impress her with his calm professionalism, feigned indifference, and rugged charm. A truly inspirational aspect of this expedition was that things did not have to happen all at once. He and Peg would share a campfire tonight, and breakfast tomorrow, tomorrow, and tomorrow. Sooner or later, they were sure to be wearing out the same sleeping bag. Cheered by that certainty, he hummed through the rest of his equipment check.

  Jake ticked off each item twice. He had a fabulous memory—360 megabytes of RAM tucked in the compweb stretched atop his skull, along with his navmatrix and music files. A Crazy Dog Blackfoot once tried to lift Jake’s hair—not for any personal reasons; just part of the usual hysteria accompanying a Crow attack. One look under Jake’s scalp, and the Crazy Dog dropped his knife and ran, spooked by gleaming fiberoptics. At a kill-talk, Jake returned the knife. The Crazy Dog apologized. Swore he would never scalp another Wasichu.

  Buckskins, dehydrated rations, shock-rifle, microstove, and lounge chairs were broken down, collapsed, and closest-packed to fit through the portal. The Hell Creek anomaly was newly opened, poorly mapped, generally a tight squeeze. The 12-megawatt mobile fusion reactor had been the most obstinate piece, harder to get through than everything else combined. People passed easily—too easily, becoming the victims of portal skips or spontaneous transmission. Metals and hardwired electronics were the worst. Only the length of stay and the ground to cover justified bringing the reactor. A herd of pack ponies would have been easier to fit through the portal, but who knew how oatburners would take to Mesozoic Asiamerica. For openers, there was no grass.

  Check completed. Jake kicked the reactor, mentally telling the gray 1.5-meter cube to get into mobile mode. With a whirr and click, the reactor sprouted four shiny legs, with white rings on the ends. The whirr became a softer hiss. The white rings inflated into four balloon tires. “Mobile” reactors were made to live up to the name.

  Jake climbed to a perch atop the pack saddle, reaching down for Peg. “So, will you come a-waltzing Matilda with me?”

  “Wat-zing Ma-tilta?” Peg looked up. She was crouched on one knee, squeezing gravelly mud through her fingers—half eager scientist, half wood nymph. “This has to be Hell Creek. Sediment’s too dry and rocky for the Tullock formation.” She brushed the dirt off.

  Time Shock. Jake recognized symptoms of a mild attack. Peg was doubting the period, feeling the air and mud, proving to herself that this world was real. Well, it was real. It was Earth. Human population, two. But Home and civilization were sixty-five million years away, thirty times faster than a trip to the Andromeda galaxy at lightspeed.

  “I’ll show you dinosaurs. Promise.” Jake knew they were bound to see the big beasts soon. He might as well claim credit now.

  Her eyes lit. “Even sauropods? It’s essential I see sauropods.” Sauropods were the big boys: brontosaurs, titanosaurs, supersaurs, and ultrasaurs. Few had made it to the Upper Cretaceous—none were known in Hell Creek.

  “Sure, sauropods.” He extended his hand further. “Don’t make ’em wait.”

  She took his offered hand, vaulting easily onto the saddle beside him.

  Jake told the reactor, “Downstream.” They lurched into motion, splashing through ponds and puddles, keeping to the lowest part of the bed, feeling for the main channel. Steep banks and ginkgo trees turned the wash into a green canyon topped by a blue ribbon of sky. Pneumatic tires left silent prints in the bare mud.

  Upper Cretaceous Montana had a semi-tropic climate and a swampy coastline; somewhere downstream was the shallow Midwestern Sea separating Asiamerica from Euramerica. For the last twenty million years, continents had been drifting apart. Montana was on the east coast of the supercontinent Asiamerica, a great arc connecting Mexico to Malaysia—taking in the northern Pacific Rim, China, Siberia, and Mongolia. The Urals were a far western archipelago.

  Greenhouse gases filled the air. Water smelled alkaline, and Jake saw signs of chemical erosion—soils leached by acid rain. Sort of like the twenty-first century Old Style, without the overpopulation, money collapse, and stoc
k market hysteria.

  The young Mesozoic sun sank quickly. Jake unshipped his shock-rifle. Late afternoon was hunting time in hot climates. He boosted his hearing, tripping the microamps in his middle ear. The rustle of wind and leaves became a roar.

  Craning his neck, he switched his corneal lenses from wide-angle to telescopic, searching for fine details. Nothing. No snapped twigs. No three-toed tracks. None of the shed teeth commonly found in Hell Creek rock. The absence of animals was eerie.

  “I’ve seen fossil beds with more left than this,” complained Peg, her forearm on his shoulder. Words boomed in his boosted ears.

  He finished fitting the shock-rifle together—telescopic vision made each part seem huge as prefab sewer pipe.

  She eyed the assembled rifle. “Nine out of ten animals in the Hell Creek formation are harmless herbivores. Chances are less than one in a hundred of meeting a really hungry carnivore. Are you worried?”

  “Me? Never.” He noted that Peg still talked in terms of sediment formations and fossil ratios, as if this were a bone hunt, not a living, breathing world. Trundling around a corner, they startled a wee furry fellow drinking from one of the ponds. It scampered for the undergrowth.

  Peg leaped to the ground, recorder running. “Why didn’t you stun it?”

  “Because it was rabbit-sized and scared senseless.” The shock-rifle was designed for dinosaurs, and would have blasted the tiny mammal’s central nervous system straight out its eyeballs. “I don’t expect it was dangerous.”

  “It was probably a protoungulate—closer to a horse than a rabbit.” She fingered prints in the soft mud, and reviewed her recordings—a 3V image of the creature repeated the scurry for safety several times.

  “But how am I supposed to know, if I don’t get a look at its teeth?”

  Jake knew all about the paleontologist’s love affair with teeth. Teeth preserved well and told you a lot. Careers were launched by broken molars—and they were happy as dental hygienists to see a clean, complete set.