She stood. Claws?
She turned around.
Was it better back inside? Was it better to be back there instead of out here in the jungle with God knew what?
No.
Mick was still inside. Nung was, too.
And that bastard Kendall.
She had to get out of here and head for the cache like Mick had told her. She had to get into the cache and find some more supplies she could use to come back here and rescue them.
She heard something low and gravelly somewhere off to her left.
Julia ducked under a nearby shrub, worming her way into the center of the mass and praying silently for whatever had produced that noise to go about its business in a direction far from where Julia sat.
She waited.
Was it moving closer to her? She closed her eyes and willed it to move further away, whatever it was. She didn’t need an encounter with a dinosaur right now. She needed to get the hell out of there.
Silence swept over the jungle. A balmy breeze blew in from her right side, making the leaves rustle against each other. Julia could easily imagine herself in some beautiful tropical resort sipping a fruity drink with a big umbrella poking out of it.
But she wasn’t there. She was down at the bottom of the world.
And most of the people she’d been charged with leading were not going home from this trip.
That fact smacked her hard across the face.
Damn.
But if she dawdled too much longer in the jungle, none of them would go home alive.
She had to move.
Julia poked her head out from the bush and looked around.
She couldn’t hear anything. Maybe the creature had vanished. Maybe it had gone someplace else.
Maybe it was a plant eater.
She hoped.
She got out onto the trail and started walking down it. She didn’t want to have to stick to the well-traveled path, but she didn’t know her way back to the entrance of the tunnel if she bushwhacked her way there. Plus, there was a chance she’d make too much noise. At least if she stayed on the trail, she could stay reasonably quiet.
Another breeze blew in. It smelled moldy. The way a trash can starts to stink in the hot humid air of summer. Julia blanched and kept moving ahead. One foot in front of the other.
That was all she’d need to do.
She kept looking back over her shoulder every few steps. She felt completely vulnerable without her rifle. The pistol she gripped in her hand felt so tiny.
Ineffective.
She wondered if she could even take out one of the dinocreatures with it, if she needed to.
Maybe. Maybe not.
The path curved again and she kept moving. She was sweating profusely. Her shirt stuck to her cracks and crevices, making it feel like she had another skin welded on to hers.
It wasn’t a pleasant feeling.
She was actually looking forward to getting back into the tunnel and then back out in the snow and the ice. At least she’d be cooler.
What had happened to Nung, she wanted to know. And what would happen to Mick? Despite what Kendall had said, Mick didn’t have to do what he’d just done back there. He didn’t have to sacrifice himself so Julia could escape. He didn’t have to do any of it.
Did that make the fact that he’d lied about his past acceptable?
Julia thought it just might.
Of course, unless she was successful at getting to the cache and coming back here to rescue them all, the argument would be over before it got started. No, the time for discussing Mick’s relationship with the truth would come later.
She wound her way down the path. Her lips were dry and she licked them, feeling the saliva go sticky and then evaporate quickly thereafter. Had the climate changed? It seemed truly hot now.
She staggered a bit in the haze. It was almost as if she could see the moisture in the plants evaporating right out of their leaves and stems — a shimmering through which she walked.
Her head hurt.
She needed a drink of water.
She would have broken the survival rules and eaten snow right then if she could have only gotten her hands on some.
Her feet felt like hundred pound weights. She dragged them now as she struggled to get further down the trail.
The air felt like she was pushing through a thick sea of molasses. It cloyed at her, tugging her back toward the ship itself. It dragged at her feet. It made her want to sit down and take a nice long rest.
Maybe a little sleep.
No!
Julia’s body tensed.
Something was wrong.
She looked at the plants close by. They seemed to lean in toward her.
What the hell was going on?
Her mind swam.
Drugs?
No.
But maybe…
The plants. It had to be them.
Had the aliens genetically altered them as well? Had they produced specimens capable of giving off a poisonous gas that could neutralize humans? Were these things planted elsewhere around the planet or just down here in their laboratory?
Maybe the aliens just used them as a type of security system.
Whatever they were for, their effect was fairly powerful. Even as Julia grasped the fact that the plants were making her feel this way, she could still feel the powerful airborne narcotic at work in her system. She’d breathed too much of it in. She had top somehow flush her system.
Get clean air.
She took off her shirt and wrapped it over her nose and mouth. She halfway doubted it would work, but she had to try. She breathed through the sweat-stained fabric. The air felt hot against her skin.
But her head cleared somewhat.
She smirked. That wouldn’t last long. The carbon dioxide would build up and start to produce the same effect on her if she wasn’t careful.
She had to get the hell out of the jungle.
She started to run a little bit. More of a jog, but it was the best she could manage. More sweat poured down her body, soaking her clothes.
But she kept moving.
One foot in front of the other.
A sharp crack to her left made her stop.
The noise was back.
What the hell was it?
She heard the growl now. Low. Sinister.
Julia’s mind was starting to shut off. If she stayed where she was, even though she might be able to hide from the creature making the noise, she’d either die or pass out from inhaling all the plant sedatives.
No, she had to keep moving.
She jogged some more down the path.
Another crack.
Another growl.
Louder this time.
Closer, too.
Julia kept moving. The skin around her mouth burned from exhaling her heated breaths back against her skin. But she tried not to be bothered by it.
Keep going!
Now instead of a growl, she heard something else.
A croak?
No.
It just sounded like that.
It wasn’t a frog, though, Julia felt very confident about that.
A branch somewhere behind her cracked. But judging from the tone of the crack, it had been a thick branch. Which would mean whatever had broken it would be something heavy.
And big.
Big concerned her.
The path wound around again. How much farther was it to the tunnel entrance? Julia kept panting, trying to keep her feet moving. Her hands gripped the pistol, but it felt slimy and slippery in her grasp.
She rounded another corner.
And saw the rock!
Yes!
She was close.
That was when she felt the sudden thundering footfalls behind her.
Julia didn’t stop running.
She just looked over her shoulder as she ran.
Good God!
It looked like something out of the Jurassic Park movies. It was almost entirely a dinosaur. But something was different.
Weird.
The hands?
No.
Oh God. She saw it then.
Jutting out of the chest of the dinosaur.
Nung’s head.