He painfully raised his knife. “I’m gonna carve you up good.” Feeling the blade’s heft, he marched toward it, praying it didn’t have anything left.
As he got closer, it didn’t move.
He jogged
It still didn’t move.
He sprinted.
Suddenly the predator lifted its front half into the air and let out a shattering roar.
Darryl froze, just watching it, the taut muscles on the bloody white underside, the huge head, the teeth flickering in the dim light.
Then the mouth snapped shut like a trap, and there was perfect silence. The great body just stood there, slightly more than six feet high.
Then, very slowly, the head turned, and the black eyes, as cold and rational as ever, focused on Darryl anew.
“Jesus.” Darryl stepped backward. The animal still had something left. It still had a lot left.
He eyed the tiny knife in his hand. He had to get away; he had to get away immediately. He turned and sprinted.
The creature threw itself into the air. And landed on the rock. Its wings weren’t working. The eyes shifted, barely able to see Darryl now. Then they slowly closed.
Sprinting awkwardly, his shoulder in agony, Darryl glanced back. He thought the predator had just closed its eyes, but he didn’t care. He’d blow the explosives he’d left on the tunnel’s floor and trap it. He ran as hard as he could. He was halfway there.
The body flinched. Then the eyes blinked and opened, focusing on Darryl anew. They could see him now. The animal coiled its front half off the rock, pushed off, and, like a wobbly airplane, rose on the diagonal.
Darryl turned back. The creature was flying again. Out of control, but flying. Clutching his knife, he ran as hard as he could. The explosives were a few hundred feet away. He could make it.
The predator veered back and forth, its rippling muscles out of sync. Then it smacked into a wall and seemed to right itself. It flew straight. It pumped its wings and suddenly surged ahead.
Darryl turned back and couldn’t believe it. The predator was really moving now.
He turned forward. The explosives were less than a hundred feet away. He could make it; he knew he could make it.
The animal flew faster, closing rapidly.
Darryl ran for dear life, chest heaving, arms pumping. The knife slipped from his hand. He just ran. The explosives were fifty feet away. Then forty, thirty, ten . . .
He ran past them and stopped at the fork.
The Demonray hurtled closer, ripping over the halos of light, seconds from the bombs.
Darryl reached for the remote.
It wasn’t there.
He frantically patted his pockets.
He found a lump, removed it, and positioned his finger over the button.
The speeding animal looked right at him and let out a deafening roar.
Darryl stared right back at it. “Yell all ya want. You’re done.” He pressed the button.
Nothing happened.
He pressed the button frantically. Nothing.
The predator sped forward, refocusing on its prey.
Darryl sprinted away. As he rounded a corner, he focused on the offshoot tunnel he’d ignored earlier, praying it had a place to hide. He ran in. . . .
Banking around the corner like a fighter jet, the animal focused on the offshoot tunnel. . . .
Darryl ran hard, looking for someplace, anyplace. He froze. It was another dead end, a solid rock wall. He turned back as the creature rocketed in. . . .
Darryl scanned the wall frantically. There had to be an opening, a crevice, something. There was nothing, just solid rock.
The predator rushed closer, dipping slightly, eyes locked, mouth opening.
Darryl backed against the wall.
The animal sped closer, dipping, a few feet above the rock.
Darryl braced himself.
The predator dipped farther, inches above the floor, a hundred feet away.
Darryl raised his fists.
The Demonray dipped again, suddenly on the rock, sliding very fast, like a train on ice. It skidded for a hundred feet and stopped a yard from Darryl’s boots.
His back against the wall, Darryl just stared at it.
The predator didn’t budge. It just lay there, eyes open, looking right at him.
He slid off the wall.
It didn’t move.
He held his breath and listened to it. There wasn’t a sound. The body wasn’t rising and falling anymore. He noticed the eyes again. They were still looking straight at the wall.
He stepped toward it.
It didn’t move.
He stepped again.
It still didn’t move.
He kicked it in the head.
No movement of any kind. The Demonray was dead.
Darryl fell hard to the floor and laughed his head off. “Just like I planned it.”
CHAPTER 93
“YOU TWO still awake out there?”
Lisa and Jason shared a stunned look. Darryl Hollis’s voice had just crackled from the little walkie-talkie, glinting slightly in the late-afternoon sun.
Jason fumbled to grab it off the rock. “Darryl?”
“Better get in here fast.”
“Why?”
“You wanna see this thing before rigor mortis sets in?”
Jason couldn’t believe it. “My God, you killed it? You actually killed it?”
“I thought you could trust people now.”
A smile. “How do we find you?”
“Just follow the light.”
I MUST have banged my damn knee somehow, Darryl thought, staggering into the central cavern. With the burning flares lighting the way, he lumbered into the middle of the giant space and lay down, wondering how much blood he’d lost. He was tired. He’d lost his wife, his best friend; he was so very tired.
Minutes later, he heard Jason’s stunned voice.
“My God, look at the size of this place.”
Lisa looked around, marveling. “Wow.”
“Impressive, huh?”
They turned, trying to see him in the flickering space. Darryl Hollis was invisible.
“Where are you?” Jason called out.
“Over here. In the middle.”
Lisa pointed. “There.”
They trotted over to him.
Jason looked down at him and smiled. “You did it. My God, you really did it.”
Darryl nodded sadly on the floor. “Monique and Craig deserved it. So did Phil.”
“They all deserved it.”
Lisa noticed Darryl’s soaked shirt and crouched. “Are you OK?”
He leaned back painfully on the rock. “Fine, Soccer Mom.”
She moved in to examine him. “Holy cow, your shoulder. We better get you a doctor.”
“Did Monique get a doctor?” Darryl turned to Jason. “Better start calling you Charlie Darwin from now on, huh?”
Jason shook his head, noticing a pair of explosives and a remote on the rock. “Leftovers?”
“Souvenirs. Take ‘em.”
Jason did, then looked around the vast cavern. “So you really killed it?”
“Body’s over there. Just follow the flares.”
Jason paused. “Will you be all right?”
“Go. You too, Lisa.”
She looked uncomfortable, even sick. “Darryl, I really think you need to see a—”
“I’ll see one later, OK? I just need some rest now.” He exhaled painfully and lay back.
Lisa nodded to Jason, and they followed the flares. Into one tunnel, then the offshoot.
From a distance, they saw it in front of the dead-end wall, something huge and dark, facing away from them. It didn’t move, but as they walked closer, in the sparkling golden light, Lisa wondered if somehow it was still alive. She stopped walking, but Jason continued until he was just a few feet away. He saw the animal wasn’t breathing. It had to be dead, and yet . . . He reached down to poke it. Then jolte
d back.
“Jesus!” Lisa jolted, too. “What’s wrong?”
“Its skin’s still warm.”
Lisa stepped backward. “What’s that mean?”
Jason paused. “Nothing. Its blood’s still settling.” Of course. Darryl had just killed it.
Jason poked it again. It didn’t more. He walked to the predator’s front. The eyes were wide open, as cold and black as ever but somehow devoid of life now. He surveyed the rest of it. Darryl’s arrows were sticking out from everywhere—left wing, right wing, the middle, the head, the horns, the face. “You want to see it?”
Lisa looked around in the sputtering light. “No.”
Jason turned back to it and started thinking like a scientist again. Darryl was right. Rigor mortis would set in. He had to do an autopsy, fast—within the next twenty-four hours. Which meant they had to get the body into a lab and . . . “How are we going to get it out of here?”
“What?”
“How are we going to move this thing?”
“I have no idea. For Christ’s sake, Jason, let’s get Darryl to a doctor first.”
“You think he’ll be OK?”
“I don’t know, but his health’s a little more important than doing a damn autopsy. I’m going to check on him. . . .” She walked away angrily, and Jason followed. She was exactly right. The autopsy could wait.
“My God, Darryl, are you really OK?”
Lisa stood over him again, eyeing the blood-soaked shirt over his missing shoulder.
He looked up at her sadly. There were tears in his eyes, and he tried to smile through them. “I’ll be fine, Soccer Mom.”
Tears formed in Lisa’s eyes too. Darryl Hollis was anything but fine, and she knew it had nothing to do with his shoulder. “I’m so very sorry, Darryl.”
He nodded sadly when . . . “Can we get a truck up here somehow?!”
Darryl chuckled. “Doesn’t waste any time, does he?”
Lisa shook her head. “No, he doesn’t.”
“You guys are gonna make a great couple, Lisa.”
“Oh, be quiet.”
“He’s in love with you.”
She hesitated. “Did he tell you that?”
“Didn’t need to. Just like you didn’t. The Big Dog sees all, Soccer Mom.”
“We’d have to airlift it up, wouldn’t we?!”
Genuinely amused, Darryl turned. “Airlift what up?!”
“The truck to carry that thing out of here!”
Darryl closed his eyes. “You’re gonna have a lot of fun with him.”
Lisa stomped toward Jason like an angry, chiding mother. “Will you take it easy, for Christ’s sake?”
“What, I want to—”
“You’re anxious—I get that—but can we just bask in the glory of this for like five seconds?”
“I’m a little . . . overeager?”
“Maybe just a smidge.”
He looked around. “This place really is incredible, isn’t it?” He picked a flare off the rock and peered into another tunnel.
Lisa looked around herself. “Honestly, Jason . . . it creeps me out a little. If you don’t mind, I’d like to get out of here. . . .” Then she realized he hadn’t heard her. He was in the tunnel.
“Lisa, come over here! Look at this!”
“What is it?”
He walked in farther. “I’ll show you!”
She reluctantly followed. “What?”
He pointed. “Look at that.”
It was dark and not easy to see, something on the middle of the floor, it looked almost like . . . “What is that?”
Jason walked closer, illuminating it with the flare: a human skeleton, bent at impossible angles, like a marionette tossed aside. “This must be where it was feeding.”
Lisa suddenly felt like she was going to lose her lunch. “Jason, I want to go right now.”
“Wait.” He walked farther in. “Look at that.”
It was near the wall on the right side. Another skeleton, eight feet long with a large triangular head. Jason recognized the type of animal it belonged to right away. Not long ago, they’d seen a much smaller version. “I think that’s a bear.”
Standing alone and growing increasingly nervous, Lisa walked forward, joining him.
Jason raised the flare, scanning the rest of the dimly lit space. “Look, there are more, looks like a couple dozen.”
Lisa swallowed nervously. “Please, Jason. I really want to go now. Come on. . . .” She started to walk away, but he grabbed her hand tightly.
“What the hell is that?”
It was near one of the bear skeletons. Something small. Something moving.
Jason moved his flare toward it. It went perfectly still, trying not to be seen.
But Jason saw it. He saw it very clearly. He suddenly couldn’t speak.
“What is it?” Lisa tried to see it, but he’d lowered his flare.
“Jason?” She put a hand on his shoulder. “Jesus, you’re shaking. What the hell is it?”
Numb, he raised the flare.
It was larger than a seagull, probably twenty pounds. A living animal. A newborn. Perhaps the first of its kind to have been born on land. A small stealth-shaped ray. Lying on the rock near the bear skeleton, it had been teething on the bone. It was perfectly frozen now, apparently frightened.
Lisa just stared at it, trying to understand. “So that thing . . . had a baby?”
Jason looked around nervously. “It couldn’t have.”
“Why?”
“I just checked. The one Darryl killed was a male.”
“Then that means—”
“There’s a female around here.”
“How could that be?”
Jason’s head shifted rapidly, looking everywhere. “A pregnant female must have followed the first one out of the water. And if there’s one, there should be a bunch. From everything we know, this order of animal spawns in large groups, so—” His head froze. “Jesus.” Five more of the tiny animals were lying near the far wall. He looked around nervously. “We better get out of here. We better get out of here right now.”
They turned and sprinted out.
CHAPTER 94
THEY HALTED at the rim of the main cavern, looking for any sign of movement. They scanned walls, tunnel mouths, the towering ceiling, everything.
Lisa thought it looked perfectly safe. “I don’t see anything.”
Jason nodded. “Me neither. Let’s get Darryl and get out of here.”
“OK.”
But neither of them moved. They just turned to Darryl, in the middle of the cavern a few hundred feet away.
“Darryl,” Jason said in a loud voice.
He didn’t move.
“Darryl!”
He didn’t flinch.
Lisa squinted, trying to see him in the dim light. “I think he might be asleep.”
Jason scanned the vast space again, but all he saw was lifeless dark rock. “Let’s get him and go. . . .” He started toward the center of the cavern when Lisa grabbed his elbow.
“Jason, look.”
He turned as another creature, slightly larger than the one Darryl had killed, glided silently out of a tunnel, then landed on the rock floor.
He dropped his flare, staring at it.
Then a second creature emerged.
Then a third. And a fourth.
From another tunnel, one more emerged. From yet another, two more. Suddenly they were flying out of every tunnel, one enormous winged body after another, gliding silently and settling on the rock floor. Four dozen in total, the creatures had surrounded Darryl, still asleep and completely unaware.
But the Demonrays were ignoring Darryl Hollis, focused somewhere else. Lisa could feel them, she could actually feel their eyes watching her and Jason. Then one of them rumbled, a deep reverberating sound. The rumble continued for moment, then ceased. Then Lisa thought she saw Darryl stir, ever so slightly.
Darryl Hollis had been dreaming. For
the first time in days, his subconscious had been in another place, a peaceful one. He’d been at home with Monique and their two kids, barbecuing on a nice summer day with Craig Summers. But then a sound had disturbed him. A strange sound. A dangerous sound. A sound he thought he’d never hear again his entire life. His eyes snapped open. Five of the creatures were staring right at him. They were twenty feet away.
“Jesus Christ.” One side of his face flat against the dank rock, Darryl didn’t move a muscle.
Another predator rumbled. Then they all rumbled, the sounds echoing like a symphony of church organs. Then, one after another, they lifted their front halves off the rock, pushed off, and flew. Within seconds, they were darting everywhere below the towering ceiling.
Darryl didn’t move. His free eye shifted, just watching them and wondering how he could escape.
Seeing this, Lisa squeezed Jason’s hand so tight the fingertips turned white. But Jason felt nothing. He just stared at Darryl, the Demonrays looking down at him. He’d be the first to go.
But Darryl Hollis told himself he could escape, he knew he could, he just had to make it to the nearest tunnel. A predator suddenly roared, and Darryl sat bolt upright. Then he noticed Jason and Lisa, their backs pressed against a wall on the perimeter. They were staring at him pitifully and Lisa was crying.
THE CREATURE roared again, and Darryl jolted to his feet, immediately running, awkwardly, painfully.
The predator swooped down toward him, eyes locked.
Frantic, Darryl ran hard, focused on the approaching tunnel. He could make it; he knew he could make it. He just had to—
Something was in front of the tunnel. Another creature.
He froze, looking for another way out. There wasn’t one. He looked up. The horrific form hurtled down toward him. Strangely, in the instant that followed, Darryl Hollis breathed easier. The certainty of it actually calmed him. He was about to see his wife and best friend again, much sooner than he’d expected. His face hardened to stone. He wouldn’t die like a coward.
The animal sped down, the open mouth rapidly growing larger. . . .
Darryl didn’t flinch. His torso was pierced then slammed vio-lently to the rock floor and devoured, just like any animal killed in the wild.
Natural Selection Page 36
