فصل 9

CHAPTER 9

We made our way to the edge of the pine trees and peered out at a vast meadow. Knee-high grass, shrubs, and tiny purple flowers covered miles of flat ground that spread out in all directions. In the distance I could just make out a faint tree line, but to the left and right the meadow seemed to go on forever. It wasn’t empty either. A small herd of what I thought were triceratops grazed about a half mile to our right, and tiny dots of green and red to our left had to be dinosaurs, but they were too far away to make out what kind. I looked up, and for the first time in my life, I saw more than just a small patch of sky. Fluffy white clouds piled on top of one another as they shuffled across a blue sky so vibrant it made my eyes hurt. I felt small as I took in all that space. I could have stared at it all day, but the snort of a triceratops snapped me back to the task at hand.

These open areas were the main thoroughfares for the larger dinosaurs, and they were dangerous. Really dangerous. It was obvious that this particular meadow used to be a farm field of some sort, based on the rotting bits of wire fencing still visible here and there, but then again, most of Indiana had been farmland if the history books were correct. Once humans were out of the picture, though, nature had reclaimed what was rightfully hers.

I pulled out my dad’s map and consulted it again. Unfortunately, it didn’t have much detail on it, but that hadn’t stopped me from checking it frequently as we hiked. Lake Michigan lay above us to the north, and my dad’s hand-drawn path was fairly easy to follow. I wished it showed things like this meadow, so we could have avoided it. But now that we were here I was too impatient to waste hours going around it when we could cut across it in minutes. Shawn wanted to camp in the trees for the night, but even though I was more tired than I’d ever been in my life, I wanted to keep going. The marines chasing us topside had spooked me more than I was willing to admit. The more distance between North Compound and myself, the better.

“Remember,” Shawn breathed in my ear. “They can hear and see about a billion times better than us.”

“Duh,” I snapped as a coil of nerves twisted in my stomach.

“Sorry. This just freaks me out. I’ve heard my whole life that these things can outrun us, outthink us, and swallow us whole, and we’re about to invite ourselves to dinner.”

“What about Herman?” I glanced around for the little dinosaur. He’d followed us for the last few hours, no doubt wondering if we were going to provide him with any more muffins, but I didn’t see him anywhere now.

“Typical Sky. Incredibly dangerous situation, and she’s worried about her new pet. Perfect.” Shawn rolled his eyes. I scanned the large meadow in front of us. It was a lot like scanning from a holoscreen, except this time we weren’t safely underground.

“Don’t stop running until we reach the trees on the far side,” I said through gritted teeth, feeling ill. “Ready?”

“As I’ll ever be,” Shawn replied. I leaped out of the cover of the trees. Shawn was right behind me as we sprinted headlong across the meadow. My eyes were focused on the distant trees, and I commanded my body to move faster. It responded. I felt alive, free.

My feeling of freedom faded as my muscles started to tire. I’d run on the compound’s treadmills for years and never had a problem logging mile after mile. This was different, like sprinting through water or wet concrete. Each step felt weighted and heavy, and my feet slipped and slid over the uneven surface. Despite the discomfort, I pumped my arms and forced myself onward for another minute, then two, then three. I felt a spark of worry. The trees didn’t appear much closer. No sooner had this thought flashed through my mind than I heard one of the triceratops give a warning bugle and the ground shuddered beneath my feet. I darted my eyes to the left just as a gigantic scaled head emerged at the far end of the meadow, followed by a massive lumbering body. My breath caught in my throat as I took in the sheer size of the thing. It was enormous. Bigger than any dinosaur I’d encountered near the compound and the last dinosaur I’d wanted to meet. It was a Tyrannosaurus rex.

I reacted on instinct, grabbing Shawn and bringing us both to the ground with a sickening thump. All of the air gushed out of my lungs, but I managed to clap my hand over Shawn’s mouth before he could make a sound.

Shawn was about to rip my hand off when the ground beneath us shook again, and his eyes went wide. Now he understood. Together we peeked our heads up through the grass. The T. rex swung its massive head back and forth, scanning the newly deserted meadow. No doubt wondering where his dinner had gone. I prayed that the camouflage body armor worked as well as the marines claimed it did.

The T. rex took a teeth-rattling step in our direction, its nose flaring. The rancid smell of decay and death floated across the field, and every muscle, nerve, and instinct wanted me to run, to hide, to save myself. But I fought it. There was a small chance it wouldn’t spot us, but there was no chance of outrunning it. Just then I heard a rustling sound behind me and my blood turned to ice. The sound got closer, and I felt Shawn reach for the stun gun.

“Don’t move,” I breathed. A compound-issued stun gun didn’t have a hope of dropping a T. rex. The rustling grew louder and closer to where we crouched, and the T. rex swung its head around to focus on our position. I tensed to run, but before I could command my muscles to react, Herman burst out of the tall grasses to my left, chattering angrily and scampering past our heads. Shawn tensed to run as the T. rex pounded toward us, but I grabbed his arm.

“Sky, it sees us!”

“Stay.” I tightened my grip. The T. rex’s gigantic legs ate up the distance faster than I would have thought possible. The new possibility of it crushing us crossed my mind right before it paused. Its head swung from side to side, scanning. I held my breath, not daring to make even that small sound. The moment seemed to hang in the air, frozen, time stretching endlessly. Suddenly, with an angry chirp, Herman sprang from the grass ahead of us and darted underneath the surprised T. rex’s feet and back toward the trees. With a roar, the T. rex whirled, its massive tail swinging only inches above our heads.

It thundered across the field, making it to the trees seconds after Herman. The little creature stopped inside the safety of the pines, clucking and squeaking angrily. If dinosaurs could insult each other, Herman was calling the T. rex all sorts of horrible things. Enraged, the T. rex began grasping trees with its massive jaws and ripping them from the ground, their roots flinging dirt in an explosion of breaking limbs.

“Now,” I breathed, grabbing Shawn’s hand and yanking him to his feet. We ran. I didn’t look back to see if the T. rex had noticed us, but when the sound of trees being ripped from the ground stopped moments later, I knew we’d been spotted.

The trees were getting closer by the second, but so was the T. rex. Its hot breath blew my hair forward, and I gagged on the smell. Panic clawed at me. Our head start wouldn’t be enough. We were ten feet away.

Five feet.

Two.

I dug deeper for one last burst of speed, and as we dove headlong into the dark safety of the trees, I heard the angry snap of the T. rex’s jaws closing on empty air.