At worst, they’d get crushed immediately. At best, they’d have to make a run for it, and then one of them might get chased down and eaten alive. No, he thought, that one was the worst scenario.
The snuffling came again from outside, but a little further away. Drake breathed out, and then sucked air deep into his lungs, conscious of his racing heart hammering on his ribs. On the next intake, he smelled something weird that he hadn’t noticed before — bitter almonds, and it was getting stronger.
He turned and leaned in close to Andy. “What the hell is that?”
“Not reptilian,” Andy said and looked down the length of the log. “More like… ”
Drake followed his gaze. Some of the things he had thought were flat stones embedded in the tree trunk’s inner walls, suddenly lifted up on eight pincer-like legs.
Oh fuck no, Drake whispered, trying to slowly reach down to pull out his gun.
“Holy shit; Pulmonoscorpius,” Andy whispered as he backed up and into Drake. “Don’t move a muscle,” he said, and kept backing up all the way past the soldier.
“Thanks,” Drake said, pointing his gun.
The thing was three feet long, and it lifted two claws before it that were larger than human hands. From behind it, a long, segmented tail extended and for now at least, the sting on its tip was straight-out flat.
Drake stared — it was shiny, like hard plastic, and segmented like it had been assembled from different pieces. It turned toward the open end of the trunk and took a few steps, but then stopped. The sounds outside hadn’t quite abated, as whatever the monstrous thing was out there still poked around. The insectoid thing obviously changed its mind and turned. Toward them.
It stopped again, seeming to balk at heading down toward the two men, and froze, watching, glossy eyes like dark buttons fixed on them.
“Early scorpion,” Andy whispered as he peered around Drake.
“Venomous?” Drake asked.
“Probably. What’s the point of having a stinger without venom? Even if it’s not highly toxic, with the size of that guy, the amount it pumped into you would probably kill you anyway.” Andy nudged Drake’s arm that held the gun.
“Don’t shoot; that big predator outside will react.”
“Right, so I’ll just give that giant scorpion a good talking to.” Drake shook his head.
The massive scorpion began to scuttle toward them, and it knew they were there as its tail went from straight-out behind it, to curling up and over its back.
“Ah, shit. Not good,” Andy whispered.
Even in the dark, Drake could see that its sting-tip was as large as an apple with a barb like a hypodermic syringe pointed straight at them. Drake knew at this range he couldn’t miss, but Andy was right; if he took out the scorpion, he might bring the thunder down from that big mother outside.
Andy tapped his arm again. “Get your knife ready. Follow my lead.”
Drake pulled his long hunting blade. Then Andy carefully moved to the other side of the log and lay one hand on the ground, palm up, and started to wiggle his middle finger. He continued to slide his other hand and arm along the inside of the trunk.
With the glass-like eyes of the scorpion, it was impossible to tell if it sighted the wiggling finger, but its head moved a fraction.
“Come on, just a nice worm for you. See, it’s wiggling, and ri-iiight here.”
One of the giant scorpion’s legs rose and came forward, then another, and in an almost mechanical motion, it began to creep forward. The huge claws opened, intent on grasping and holding the moving finger so it could deploy its stinger.
“Re-eeeady,” Andy breathed.
The scorpion rushed forward, hunger overtaking any caution. Andy swept his other arm across and grabbed the foot-long tail just under the bulbous stinger. The massive claws reached up for Andy’s hand.
“Now.”
Drake swept his blade across, just under Andy’s hand, and severed the chitinous appendage. The massive scorpion went mad, scrambling and skittering. In another second, the thing vanished in a blur of thrashing legs out the other end of the log.
Andy tossed the barb out after it. He turned with a big kid-like grin splitting his face.
“And that, Sergeant Brawn, is why you need me.”
CHAPTER 35
The stream turned into a broad, shallow river, and then turned into a swamp.
“That’s just great,” Emma seethed.
There was no more riverbank, no path, just a lot of water that was probably shallow, but as it was ink-black, it could have been bottomless for all she knew. To add to the eerie setting, there was a mist hanging listlessly over the dark water. And its surface wasn’t still; there were ripples, pops of bubbles, and the signature V-waves on the top as things moved about in the depths.
She’d seen enough of the lake to know that things took advantage of water, and the more water, the bigger the creatures were that made it their home.
Emma flipped her goggles from light-enhance to amplify and immediately the green fluorescent landscape became enlarged. She turned slowly — there were mangrove-type roots up on stilts, numerous palms, ferns, fronds, and things that looked melted or rotted with decay. The humidity was all-encompassing, and everything was wet, dripping, and smelled of sulfur and methane.
In amongst the trees, she could make out the massive column-like legs and rotund bodies of enormous creatures, their heads lost in the dark foliage canopies way overhead. They were near motionless, and the only sound came from the occasional gurgle of bellies and bursts of gas she assumed were dinosaur farts.
She breathed a little easier, if not through her mouth. One of the things she’d learned was that if the plant-eaters rested easy, then predators probably weren’t close by. She turned, scanning the swamp, and then in the direction she needed to try and get to.
“Maybe,” she whispered. Just over the other side of a stretch of water was what looked like dry ground.
She crouched, scanning along the banks, and then the water, looking for places to cross.
Dumb, dumb, and dumber, she thought. She’d done her homework and researched what she could potentially run into in this time period — and there was plenty to fear in the waterways, swamps, and generally boggy areas.
There were the ancestors of massive eels, snakes, heavy-jawed fish, and the crocodiles. Monstrous things like the Deinonychus that reached 35 feet in length, and probably chowed down on other dinosaurs. She’d be a tasty morsel to something like that.
But then again, those big plant-eaters wouldn’t be looking so chilled out if there was a 10-ton, 35-foot croc hanging around.
She plotted her path — down to the water’s edge, and then leap to that first large flat stone, and then to the next. Finally to leap off and sprint the rest of the way — if it was as shallow as she hoped, she’d be over the other side in an instant. The key tactic was to stay out of the water as much as possible.
Emma stood, wiped her hands on her pants, and walked down to the water’s edge and looked in — nothing. She had zero chance of seeing the bottom. She looked out to the first flat rock about 10 feet hence, and then backed up, five, 10, 20 feet.
Emma exploded forward, sprinting, and then leaping from the water’s edge to the flat stone. She came down and tried to stick her landing, but oddly the stone sank a few inches.