Lex nodded. “You heard Gus. Let’s go.”
Within a few minutes, everyone was on the ground except Dawn. At Tasha’s urging, she took her time on the way down. Gus stood below, spotting her in case of another fall. He couldn’t help watching her shapely behind, wondering if he’d gone too far, if she’d hold the kisses against him.
Damnit, he thought, what was I thinking? I’m her superior officer.
He forced his gaze down to Dawn’s bare foot and then concentrated on what the others behind him were saying. “We need real weapons,” Lex complained, just as Tasha answered, “Big sticks work. Look for one.” Then Kris asked, “Where’s Dawn’s boot in all this mess?” as Harry replied, “That’s dinoturbation for you. It’s a wonder the forest ever recovers from such devastation.”
Gus glanced back, suddenly feeling someone’s gaze on him. It was Lex Smith.
“You know, Commander, I think we should try Jean-Michel,” Lex said. “Maybe the Keeper transported him here, too.” He reached into his back pocket and retrieved his communicator. “Jean-Michel, do you copy?”
To Gus’s amazement, the Frenchman’s voice rang out, “Oui! It is good to hear your voice, Dr. Smith. What happened?”
“We’re not exactly sure,” Lex said.
Gus looked back at the tree and saw that Dawn was almost down. He listened as Jean-Michel went on, “One moment I was orbiting Mars, and then – voilà! – I was here. There is such a dreadful silence. No satellites or space stations, not on Earth or in the rest of the Solar System. And the night side of Earth... why, except for occasional lightning strikes, it is black. There are no city lights. No lights from fishing fleets. I am so unfamiliar with this view.”
Kris moved in beside Lex. “Have you run any tests, Jean-Michel? What about the constellations?”
“When I placed the current star map in the computer, I could not believe my eyes. You should see the sky. The positions of the stars match the time around the late Cretaceous.”
Holy crap, Gus thought.
Jean-Michel continued, “I also ran the continental drift program backward in the computer and matched the positions of the landmasses to the time period.” His voice sounded slightly off-key. “It fits, you know. Give or take one hundred thousand years, it is 66 million B.C.E.”
Gus frowned, feeling skeptical again. Jean-Michel had to be wrong. It was clear; he was also a prisoner of the Keeper’s VR experiment.
Just then, Dawn reached the ground, and Gus turned to Harry. “What’s significant about that date? I’ve heard it before.”
“66 million years ago – the K/T,” Harry explained. “The Cretaceous-Tertiary boundary, the most recent large mass extinct. The K stands for kreta, which means chalk––”
“Okay, okay, I get you,” Gus cut in. “Don’t sound so goddamned happy about it, for Christ’s sake! I remember. Giant asteroid hits the Earth. Everyone dies.”
“Not everyone,” Kris countered. “Maybe eighty-five percent went extinct, including all the dinosaurs, with the exception of birds, who shared the same ancestry with the theropod dinosaurs. Of course, some mammals survived as well, including our ancestors.”
While Tasha assisted Dawn in replacing her boot, Gus got his communicator out and said to Jean-Michel, “This is Granberg. Why didn’t you hail us earlier today?”
“Commander, I could not raise you. I surmised that if you were indeed on Earth, then I was on the wrong side of the planet and out of radio contact.”
“Okay,” Gus said. “Where’s our...?”
“Ah, you should see the continents from orbit. They’re very different. There is a large sea cutting through the interior of North America. Here, I will relay a picture.”
“Not now, Jean-Michel. Listen to me. Just tell me... is our lander here?”
Jean-Michel paused for a moment. “You are standing in ancient North America. I have calculated the appropriate latitudes and longitudes for this time period and then placed them on a map projection. The lander is one kilometer west of your position, at the late Cretaceous latitude of sixty-four degrees north, forty-five minutes, six seconds. Longitude is one hundred and...”
The rest of his answer was drowned out by the jubilant shouts of the crew. In a moment, after they quieted down, the Frenchman asked, “Please, please, are you all right? Why are you screaming?”
“We’re relieved, that’s all,” Gus said, allowing himself a smile. He picked up a big stick. “With the lander here, we’ll be able to defend ourselves against the dinosaurs.”
“Did you say dinosaurs?” Jean-Michel asked. “I know about the time period, but, but I cannot truly believe it.”
“Uh huh.” Gus exchanged a look with Dawn. “And some of them are real nasty. Use the J-Stars to watch for anything approachin’ us.”
“Roger that,” Jean-Michel said. “I see a large herd moving northeast of your position.”
“We know about them,” Gus said.
“And there is something large – actually three very large creatures about a half kilometer to the east. They are not moving, however.”
“That must be T. rex,” Harry said. “Probably feeding on a carcass by now. I’m not surprised there are three of them. They roamed in packs.”
“Packs of T. rex?” Gus asked in alarm as he glanced at the surrounding forest. “Then we’d better get a move on and get the hell out of here.” He looked back at his crew and noted with satisfaction that Lex already held a club. His gaze swept over the others. “Each of you gather up as big a stick as you can handle and some rocks.” He grabbed a tree limb from the ground and hefted it in his hand, the wood solid and heavy. “Put the rocks in your pockets. If anything attacks us, we can bash their brains in.” He studied the purplish bruises already forming on Dawn’s arms and legs. “Are you all right?”
“Yeah, I guess so,” she said. Her voice sounded tense, and she shot him a funny look, the kind he couldn’t easily read.
He hesitated. Was she scared, or just really pissed off about the kisses? “I only meant if you’re hurting let me know. We can slow up a bit.”
She nodded, then turned away to finish gathering rocks with the others.
Gus gave up trying to figure her out and looked off, gauging the slant of the sun. “Let’s go,” he said as they struck out for the lander.
***
According to Jean-Michel’s coordinates, Gus knew they were nearing the Valiant. Reduced to a slow trot because of Dawn’s aching limbs, they moved forward cautiously, sticks in hand, everyone wearing their earpieces and hooked in with each other and Jean-Michel.
Gus tried to dispel the big knot in the pit of his stomach, but he couldn’t; they were that vulnerable. If Jean-Michel had it wrong and the lander wasn’t there, they’d be in deep shit. Then, to his surprise, he stumbled upon a large tooth, banana-shaped, yet lethally sharp, probably from a T. rex. Harry explained that dinosaurs constantly shed and rejuvenated their teeth, much like sharks did in the ocean.
Gus studied the tooth in his hand. It was wicked-looking, with serrated edges on the fore and aft sides. “If we can’t get to our ship, then these will make good spear points. There’s no telling what’ll attack us next.”
Tasha nervously regarded the deepening woods. “Don’t talk of such things. We need guns.”
“That’s a given, Doc.” Gus moved on in the lead, until he reached the crest of a hill. Before him lay a vast basin cut by a meandering river. Dusk had settled in, and large herds of dinosaurs milled around on the plain, reminding him of the Serengeti.
From this distance, the only thing noticeably different from modern-day Africa was the lack of grass. Harry said grasses had only recently evolved in the Late Cretaceous, and they were apparently still sparse in this region. As a result, fields of ferns, broken by copses of flowering shrubs, stretched to the far horizon.
Gus lifted his gaze from the fern prairie. In the distance stood a craggy, snow-capped mountain range, bluish in the fading light. Kris moved in besi
de him.
“The Rockies,” she said quietly. “They’re so young! I can’t believe I’m seeing this.”
Gus saw Harry grab Kris’s hand. The two scientists looked ecstatic, getting off on the mountains. Well, it takes all kinds, he thought. As for him, he gave the Rockies only a cursory look; there were more important matters to consider now. He strained to see the valley floor, searching for the lander. Then he spotted something. Was it his imagination, or had he caught the barest glint of metal?
His gaze swept across the shadowy landscape. Sure as hell, there she was! The Valiant was nestled amidst some boulders near the bottom of the slope.
Gus let out a whoop of joy as he started down the hill. Suddenly, he remembered himself and then glanced back at Dawn.
With a smile, she motioned him forward. “Go on. I’ll catch up.”
He smiled back at her and then took off. He was already inside the ship by the time the others reached the hatch. “She’s a sight for sore eyes,” he said as his fellow astronauts crossed the threshold one by one. He spoke into his communicator. “We’re in, Jean-Michel. Do you copy?”
“Yes, Commander, I copy.” His voice starting fading in and out as the spacecraft slipped past the Terminator to the far side of Earth. “I believe... today is your lucky day... talk again soon... resume at acquisition of signal.”
“Roger that.” Gus looked at Dawn. “If you hear from your Keeper friend any time soon,” he said with sarcasm, “give him our thanks.”
He walked to the far wall and unlocked the cabinet housing the weapons. The arsenal, placed on board at the insistence of the astronauts, was intended for use in the event of a crash landing in hostile Earth territory, or if dangerous aliens were discovered on Mars. This was not as bizarre as it sounded. Although few people knew it, the Apollo astronauts had been equipped with weapons, too, in case they’d found something menacing on the Moon.
Realistically, there were areas on Earth where warfare and mayhem could threaten the safety of a stranded crew. The idea of astronauts being captured by terrorists or a renegade government had sobering implications. Along with hunting knives, automatic handguns, rifles, and shotguns (including Winchester Model 70 Series bolt-action hunting rifles, Desert Eagle automatic side arms, and Remington Model 870 shotguns), the ship had been equipped with a laser-sighted electromagnetic cannon, capable of blasting a hole in an elephant, or a Tyrannosaurus rex.
“Thank your Keeper just the same, Dawn,” Gus said as he strapped on a side arm, “because without these, we’d all be dead meat.”
“It might be a good idea to lock the door,” Harry urged. “We wouldn’t want any predators manipulating the locks.”
“Right.” Gus started for the hatch.
“Are you going outside now?” Tasha asked, her tone shaded with fear. “It is dark.”
“No, Doc,” Gus said. He bolted the hatch from the inside. “And I’m not taking this gun off until we find a way out of here, back to our own time.”
Almost to himself, he whispered, “If we ever get out of here.”
No, he had to think positively. Glancing at his crew, then concentrating on Dawn, he decided it was up to him now. He’d find a way out of this stinking hellhole.
He had to.
***
Dawn and her fellow astronauts ate a big supper and then Gus shared with them a surprise: one of two bottles of Jack Daniel’s he’d hidden in his gear. After each raised a glass to the Valiant, they went off to their sleeping cubicles, secure in the knowledge that, at least for now, they were safe within their spacecraft.
By mid-morning, Dawn sat at the table nursing a mug of tea, watching Gus as he pressed them for a plan. He hadn’t touched her since he’d kissed her, and she guessed he was just as confused as she.
“Granted, we have to stay here,” Gus said as he surveyed an uneaten portion of his breakfast. “There’s nowhere else for us to go, unless we travel to ancient Mars,” he half-laughed, half-snorted at this, “so we might as well take advantage of the situation and do some exploring.”
Harry’s eyes lit up, while Tasha exchanged a worried look with Lex.
“We need to take complete inventory of all medical equipment,” she said in an uncharacteristically soft tone. “I do not wish to sound pessimistic, but I am thinking it is very important we have everything ready in case someone is injured.”
Gus took a sip of his coffee. “You’re probably wastin’ your time, Doc, since everything else has been accounted for. We’ve got a Rover. Even our spacesuits are here.” He directed his next comments to Dawn. “Your Keeper friend included your spacesuit with our gear, too. Seein’ the way you came on ahead of us, he was pretty thorough, wasn’t he? Just one Rover’s missing, and the robot digger and our Google glasses, too. Can’t figure that out, but what the heck, the alien got everything else here, so I’m not complaining.”
Dawn nodded, recalling how she’d discarded her equipment before speaking to the Keeper. How had he done it? How had he transported all of them and their stuff here? Even the Destiny and Jean-Michel? It was unbelievable. What kind of powers were we talking about? Teleportation?
She thought about the implications of what this meant. Hadn’t the writer Arthur C. Clarke written something about advanced technology being so far beyond normal as to be indistinguishable from magic? No wonder she was feeling awestruck.
“Yeah, well,” Gus continued. “The Keeper also put our lander in a good strategic position. The embankment above us is quite steep – no dinosaurs can attack from that direction – and we have a good view of the valley floor from the other side. So, for the moment, I’m satisfied. I think we can relax a little.”
“Be that as it may, Lex and I wish to stay here today.” Tasha frowned. “I have had enough of dinosaurs.”
“That’s fine. I understand. No one’s forcing you to do anything you don’t want to do.” Gus turned to Dawn. “Anyone who wants to go,” he indicated her, Harry, and Kris with quick nods, “can head out with me in the Rover today.”
Dawn nodded back. “Yes, I’ll go with you.” She did a double-take. Was it her imagination, or had Gus held her gaze just a moment longer than necessary, before looking down at his mug.
“Well, you read my mind.” Harry grinned as he looked over at Kris, who seemed just as excited.
Gus studied Harry’s expression. “Just remember something. We don’t know what to expect out there. I’ll admit I’m worried, but I won’t be held prisoner here. I think our weapons will do the trick and protect us.”
“I understand,” Harry said.
“I hope you do.”
“Hey, dude, lighten up – I do understand,” Harry said emphatically. “But the big herds are made up of ceratopsians, like Triceratops prorsus. They’re harmless. All ceratopsians are herbivores – that means they eat plants.”
Gus frowned. “Yeah, I know, dude,” he’d loudly emphasized that last and Dawn smiled at his sarcasm, “but what hunts ‘em? Meat-eaters? Just be prepared for trouble.” He got to his feet. “Don’t love good ol’ T. rex too much. Warm-blooded or not, he’d eat you alive if he got the chance.” He went over to the weapons and selected a rifle and a hunting knife. “We may have to kill one, so like I said... be prepared.”
Unsettled, yet excited, Dawn locked eyes with Kris, who grinned as she said, “First dibs on the driver’s seat.”
***
By noon, the well-armed foursome sat in the Rover. It was a clear, sunny day with only a slight breeze coming from the northwest. With Kris behind the wheel, they headed toward the valley floor. Gus rode shotgun, with the E-M cannon mounted on the rear of the Rover, while Dawn and Harry wore headsets, which recorded everything in their path.
Jean-Michel monitored them in the Destiny; through VR, he saw the same sights as his fellow astronauts on Earth. The Frenchman had patched in data from the J-Stars, so the crew could detect any approaching animals, especially important as they moved toward the largest dinosaur herds.
“Do you see them?” Jean-Michel’s voice burst into Dawn’s headset. “Look over there, to the southwest.”
She focused on the small viewing lens attached to her headset, located in front of her right eye. A large blip moved across the lens’ map projection, heading toward the northwestern part of the screen.
“Wow!” Harry pulled off his headset and tilted his head, staring up. “Take a look at that.”
Dawn adjusted the VR zoom for a closer look, catching sight of the migrating flock, hundreds of gray bodies knifing in V-formation, standing out against the clear sky.
“Man, look at the size of those birds,” Gus said.
“Not birds,” Harry corrected him. “They’re pterosaurs – flying reptiles. You’ve heard of ‘em, eh?” He was now looking through his binoculars. “Average wingspan seems to be about six or seven meters,” he said, rattling off statistics. “And I think... yeah, this species is called Pteranodon longiceps. Notice the heads are longer than the bodies, give or take a half meter.”
The pterosaurs’ heads were large, perhaps man-sized, Dawn noted, with long, toothed beaks. She adjusted her headset, using the zoom for an even closer look. Even more intriguing were the cranial crests resting on the tops of their skulls. Of differing sizes and shapes, they were unique to each creature.
“I’m clocking them at thirty-one kilometers per hour,” Jean-Michel said. “They move like the wind!”
Kris stopped the Rover as the pterosaurs flew directly overhead. In the shadow created by the huge flock, the astronauts waited. Soon a cacophony of echoing, hornlike calls filled the air as the pterosaurs alternately flapped their wings and then glided on the wind.
“Heads slightly down, five joints per wing ending with a megafinger.” Harry’s voice broke slightly. “God – yes! Yes! We thought they’d fly like that.” He lowered his binoculars and grinned. “Fur, they’re covered with fur. We knew it was so from the fossils, but to actually see it is just awesome.”
Dragon Dawn (Dinosaurian Time Travel) Page 16
