by C. G. Mosley
Matt’s eyes lit up. “So, if we can just get to a jeep—”
“Forget about the jeeps,” Hardcastle interrupted. “Remember, most of the compound has been under over twenty feet of water…and it still isn’t completely gone. I seriously doubt we’ll be able to get any vehicle around here running. We’ll have to do it on foot.”
Charlie began laughing maniacally. “You’re kidding, right?” she asked, trying to catch her breath.
Hardcastle chewed his lip as he looked over at her. “I’m afraid not,” he said. “At the rate this water is receding, by tomorrow morning, it should be all but gone.”
“Well, that’s a great plan, Glenn,” Matt grumbled, his words oozing sarcasm. “But what about—oh, I don’t know…the dinosaurs?”
Hardcastle closed his eyes tightly and bit his lip to keep himself from saying something he’d regret. As much as he couldn’t stand him right now, the fact still remained that he needed Matt’s help.
“The safest time to try something like this is the early morning hours,” he replied. “Most of the meat-eaters are settling in to sleep after a night of hunting.”
“It’s still dangerous,” Charlie chimed in.
“It’s suicide,” Matt agreed.
Hardcastle crossed his arms and leaned against the side of the refrigerator. “It’s the only chance I think we have,” he replied. “We can only stay here so long before the Troodons figure out a way to get us. If you two have a better idea, I’d like to hear it.”
“Actually, I do,” Matt said after he pondered the suggestion for a moment.
Hardcastle raised his eyebrows and pushed his hat back. “Well, let’s hear it, Doc,” he said.
“I know the bunker you’re talking about,” he replied. “It’s the closest one to the compound—maybe a couple of miles away.”
“That’s correct,” Hardcastle said. “It’s just under a mile and a half away.”
“And it’s fitted with an underground tunnel that connects it to the compound,” he added.
Hardcastle sighed and shook his head. “I know all about that tunnel,” he replied. “Eric had that thing built when he built the area that is now the ground floor of this building. And I hate to burst your bubble, but without power, the only way into that tunnel is from the bunker. The door is padlocked from the inside.”
Charlie paced the floor. “And how exactly do you know that?” she asked, sounding quite annoyed.
“I know because I’m the one that installed the lock,” Hardcastle answered.
Matt and Charlie stared at him, confused.
Hardcastle shoved his hands in his pockets and leaned harder on the refrigerator. “That tunnel is not structurally safe anymore. I started noticing stress cracks in several places about a year after it was built. Eric got a little too economical on it and didn’t use the commercial grade concrete that is needed to support the weight of eight feet of soil,” he explained. “There is a lock on this end of the tunnel too. It’s no longer safe for anyone to go into it. And that was before the earthquakes started…I doubt it’s even clear anymore.”
“But if it is clear…” Charlie said.
“It’s our ticket to safety,” Matt finished.
“That’s a mighty big if,” Hardcastle cautioned.
Matt pondered the situation for a solid minute before suggesting, “What if we make our way through the tunnel from this end, and when we arrive at the door for the bunker, we somehow break the door down.”
Suddenly, it was Hardcastle’s turn for maniacal laughter. “You’ve got to be joking,” he said. “That door is six inches of pure steel, and I didn’t go cheap on the lock for it either.”
“And it would be dangerous for us if we got stuck on the far end of a one-mile tunnel when an earthquake could start up again at any moment,” Charlie added.
“Right,” Hardcastle said, pointing at her.
“I think the argument could be made that it’s equally dangerous for us to go trouncing through the jungle on foot to get into the bunker,” Matt argued. “With the power out, how do we even know we can get into it?”
“I’d have thought by now you’d have finally accepted the fact that the power failure has caused all of the locks to release,” Hardcastle sneered. “If you need a reminder, go look at all the blood in the hallway.”
Matt looked away and said nothing. Charlie could feel the tension building again.
“Okay, what about this,” she began. “Only one of us goes to the bunker. That person unlocks the door and then makes their way back through the tunnel toward the compound to retrieve the other two.”
Hardcastle rubbed his chin as he pondered the idea. “That’s still way more time for one person to be in that tunnel than I’m comfortable with,” he said. “And let’s say someone makes it and enters the tunnel only to find that halfway back it’s collapsed and impassable?”
Charlie frowned. “I didn’t think about that,” she said.
“The radios,” Matt said. “We’ve got the two-way radios.”
Hardcastle perked up and opened one of the cabinet doors on the wall. After a minute of searching, he found what he was looking for.
“Right. Whoever the lucky person is that makes the trip to the bunker takes a two-way radio with them,” he said as he turned the knobs on the devices to make sure they were working. “If they find the tunnel is not operational, they can radio the other two and they will have to pony up and make the trip through the jungle too.”
Charlie smiled. “I think that’s it…that’s our plan,” she said gleefully.
The three of them celebrated briefly when suddenly reality brought them crashing back down.
“So, who’s going to be the lucky one to make the trip?” Matt asked. They all looked at each other for a long minute.
“We draw straws,” Charlie suggested.
“I’ll draw,” Matt said, and there was a slight tremble in his voice.
“No one is drawing straws,” Hardcastle said. “We all know that it’s got to be me. You both knew it when we were drawing this crazy plan up…don’t play dumb, it’s insulting.”
“No,” Charlie replied firmly. “We draw straws. It’s the only fair way to do this.”
Hardcastle laughed. “Yeah, have you forgotten that there are five Troodons roaming around outside that door? Whoever is going may have to deal with them. You both know there is no one else trained to deal with this situation better than me.”
Matt looked at Charlie. “He’s right,” he said, a little too quickly.
Charlie took a deep breath. It was getting hotter in the building by the minute and she could feel beads of sweat sliding downward between her shoulder blades. The anxiety she was feeling wasn’t helping the matter either.
“Are you absolutely sure?” she asked.
Hardcastle nodded slowly. “And so are you,” he added with a smile.
He turned away and began to rummage through the kitchen drawers. He plundered until he found the largest knife available. He ran his thumb over the blade gently. It was extremely sharp. It wasn’t much, but it was a weapon.
“You think you can kill them with that?” Matt asked, pointing toward the knife.
“No,” Hardcastle replied. “I think I can kill them with this,” he said, pulling the gun from his waistband. “But when I run out of bullets, I’ll need backup.”
Charlie looked to the knife and back up into Hardcastle’s eyes. “I don’t know about this,” she said, unable to contain her worry.
“It’s the only option we’ve got,” Hardcastle replied as he moved to the door. He paused and removed a ring of keys from his pocket. He picked through the keys until he found the one he was looking for, removed it, and handed it to Charlie. “That’s the key you’ll need to remove the padlock on this end,” he said. “Whatever you do, don’t lose it!”
“Don’t worry,” she replied, dropping the small gold key into her pocket.
Hardcastle paced the floor for a few minutes
in thought, when suddenly an idea popped into his head. He manhandled the couch out of the way and slowly cracked the door open so that he could see into the hall. One direction looked clear, but he was unable to see the other way.
“Use the knife,” Charlie suggested.
Hardcastle glanced back at her, at first unsure of what she meant. Suddenly, it hit him. He pulled the knife from his belt, slowly pushed it into the hallway, and then used it as a mirror to see if there was any danger waiting on him outside his field of vision. Satisfied the coast was clear, he began to exit the room.
“Push the couch back over the door,” he called back to them.
“What are you doing?” Charlie asked. “You said the water below wouldn’t be gone until in the morning!”
Hardcastle glanced over his shoulder at her. “Right,” he said. “Which is why I’m taking the skywalk over to the Triangle Building. That building was constructed on higher ground. I’m hoping that there is some dry land on the other side of it—or at least that it’ll be shallow enough for me to wade through it until I get to dry land. And besides, maybe the Troodons will follow me and leave this building too. Wish me luck.”
“I’m still not sure about this,” Charlie replied. Suddenly, it occurred to her that she should give him an extra warning about the large female Troodon…the one they called Mother, but it was too late.
Glenn Hardcastle was gone.
Chapter 12
As it turned out, breakfast basically consisted of a couple of McDonald’s sausage biscuits. It was somewhat disappointing, but Jonathon was hungry enough he simply didn’t care. Once he’d completed his second biscuit, he dabbed the grease away from his lips with a napkin and looked over at Cornelius Cold seated next to him.
“I’m still not clear on why you’re coming along,” he said. He had to raise his voice slightly so that he could be heard over the noisy plane engines.
Mr. Cold took a sip of orange juice through a straw. “I’m not going to be getting off the plane,” he explained. “However, I would like to get a view of the damage done to the compound and the island in general. We’ll have to start making preparations to make repairs.”
Jonathon nodded and then took a drink from his own bottle of orange juice. Harley was seated in a seat in front of and facing him. She was munching on a second biscuit of her own and still wearing the mirrored Aviator sunglasses. It was impossible to tell what she was looking at.
“So, you’ve been working with Cold for a while now?” Jonathon asked her.
She nodded. “About ten years,” she said. “The past two years we’ve worked together very closely all over the world.”
Jonathon raised his eyebrows and looked over at Cold. “Is that right?” he said. “And just what exactly do you guys do all over the world?”
“If we told you that, we’d have to kill you,” Harley replied with a wide smile.
Cold allowed a slight chuckle and leaned closer so that Jonathon could hear him. “I know you’re aware of the operation Eric Gill was running off the island,” he began. “After reviewing all the paperwork and files in his office, we figured out he’d sold seventeen dinosaurs to different black market buyers all over the world. Harley and I have worked closely to get them all back.”
Jonathon felt his interest peak. He looked back to Harley. “So, you’ve got experience with these animals then?”
“If you consider ‘experience’ as moving a dinosaur from one cage to another, then yeah, I’ve got a lot of that,” she replied, still smiling.
Jonathon nodded and peered out the window. He hadn’t thought of it that way, but he supposed getting the animals and transporting them somewhere else was probably a fairly easy process.
“It’s the people we have had to worry about,” Cold said, as if reading his thoughts. “The people that we had to go and take these animals from spent a great deal of money for them and were not too happy about us taking them away.”
“Any of them get violent about it?” Jonathon asked.
Harley’s smile instantly disappeared. “Oh yes, a couple of them did…they lost their lives over it.”
Jonathon felt himself involuntarily swallow hard. He knew that Harley said she’d been an assassin, but she didn’t really look like the portrait of a trained killer. As he pondered that thought, the plane hit a bit of turbulence and it was enough to cause him to bang his head against the window.
Harley chuckled. “Do you like flying?” she asked.
Jonathon rubbed his head and glanced over at her. “I used to,” he grumbled. “I think I’m starting to hate it though.”
“Ha, well have you ever sky-dived?” she asked, and something about the way she said it reminded him of the excitement a small child gets when they learn to do something new.
He shook his head. “Nah, I’m fine with staying inside of the perfectly good airplane,” he said with a smile.
Harley began to laugh and she looked over to Mr. Cold only to see him immediately look away in an effort to avoid eye contact. Suddenly, a very bad feeling began to come over Jonathon. He looked back to Harley with his eyes narrowed.
“Don’t tell me we’re going to jump out of this airplane today,” he said very matter-of-factly.
Harley immediately stopped laughing and returned her sunglasses to her face. “Okay, I won’t tell you anything,” she replied. “I’ll just drag your ass out with me.”
She then got up from her seat and made her way toward the cockpit. Jonathon felt his anxiety level begin to rise significantly. He looked over to the seats on the opposite side of the plane and saw Victor looking at him, a wide smile on his face. Cliff was looking at him too, although his expression was slightly more sympathetic. Hank Bailey was asleep and seemed to be oblivious to the rest of the world. Jonathon could see that his mouth was agape and he was drooling. Mr. Cold was still looking away.
“Look at me,” Jonathon said to him through clenched teeth.
Cold slowly turned his head forward, but he stopped short of looking at him. “I was afraid if I told you that you would refuse to come along,” he said.
“Well, you would’ve been correct,” Jonathon snapped. “Why can’t we just land on the airstrip?”
“Think about it, Jonathon,” Cold replied, finally looking at him. He seemed annoyed by the question. “A category five hurricane just pummeled the island. I assure you the airstrip is in no condition for us to safely land.”
“I’m not jumping out of this airplane,” Jonathon said adamantly. He was furious and made no attempt to hide it.
Harley Cash returned from the cockpit with a harness in her hand. “You are going to jump out of this airplane,” she said, leaning toward Jonathon. “But you’re not doing it alone. You’ll tandem with me.”
She held out the harness to him. He looked at it and felt a wave of nausea come over him. “You’re sure that thing will hold me?” he asked.
“I guarantee that it will,” she replied. “Trust me, I’ve done this countless times. You will be fine.”
Jonathon stared at it a few seconds longer before finally taking the harness.
Harley smiled. “Put it on, and let me know when you’ve got it on so I can look you over. We’re jumping in five minutes.”
Jonathon nodded, unable to speak. He wasn’t sure if it was due to excitement or sheer fear. He then looked around and noticed Cliff and Victor were putting on their parachutes. Mr. Cold had gotten up and was leaning over Hank’s seat, whispering something into his ear—he was apparently awake now. Jonathon wondered what they could be speaking about in such secrecy but his mind was too occupied with thoughts of freefalling to his death to be overly concerned about it.
Harley had just finished putting on her own parachute when she returned to check on Jonathon’s progress.
“How high are we right now?” he asked as she handed him a pair of goggles.
She smiled widely. “I’m not saying anything to contribute to your distress,” she said as she pulled her
own goggles over her face. She looked around and motioned for the rest of the team to draw closer. Once the other men had huddled around her, she said, “Okay, Jonathon and I will go first, followed by Hank, Cliff, and finally Victor. We all meet at the rendezvous point as soon as possible. Remember that time is of the essence. The longer we have to wait on everyone to arrive, the more vulnerable we become.”
“We got it, Cash,” Hank said as he shoved a handgun into a holster around his thigh. “Let’s get on with this.”
Harley glared at him for a fraction of a second, but it was long enough for Jonathon to catch it. There was a hint of annoyance in her eyes. “Visibility is going to be bad until we get through the thick mist that envelopes the island,” she continued. “That makes hitting our mark a little challenging. Once you’re through the mist, there will be approximately 1200 more feet to go before we reach the ground. Obviously, there is no way to predict what could be waiting on you when you’re through.”
Jonathon swallowed hard as he thought about the hungry tyrannosaurs he’d encountered on the island in his prior visits. The worst-case scenarios he could think of were plentiful and he suddenly found himself trying to remember how Mr. Cold had talked him into returning to the island again. With great reluctance, he removed his fedora and shoved it into his duffel bag. Losing it would undoubtedly make this trip worse than it already was.
“Any questions?” Harley asked. All of the men shook their heads in unison.
“We will do a low pass to check on you before we leave the area,” Cold said.
Harley looked at him, somewhat surprised. “Are you sure that’s a good idea?” she asked. “I can radio you if there is a problem.”
Cold waved her off. “I want to be sure that you all are alright while we’re still nearby and can offer assistance if needed,” he said. “One quick pass below the mist and we will get out of here.”
“Alright,” Harley replied. “But make sure you circle for about ten minutes to give us time to get out of the way. I’d hate for you to come through the mist only to immediately get tangled up in someone’s parachute.”
