Thorne held his breath. He was trying to think what to do, but he couldn't think of anything at all. The animals were methodical, the first one moving aside so the second could enter as well,
Suddenly, from along the side of the store, a half-dozen glaring lights shone out in bright beams. The lights moved, splashed on the dinosaurs' bodies. The beams began to move back and forth in slow, erratic patterns, like searchlights.
The dinosaurs were clearly visible, and they didn't like it. They growled and tried to step away from the lights, but the beams moved continuously, searching them out, crisscrossing over their bodies. As the lights passed over their torsos, the skin paled in response, reproducing the movement of the beams, after the lights had moved on. Their bodies streaking white, fading to dark, streaking white again.
The lights never stopped moving, except when they shone into the faces of the dinosaurs, and into their eyes. The big eyes blinked beneath their hooded wings; the animals twitched their heads and ducked away, as if annoyed by flies.
The dinosaurs became agitated. They turned, backing out of the shed, and bellowed loudly at the moving lights.
Still the lights moved, relentlessly swinging back and forth in the night. The pattern of movement was complex, confusing. The dinosaurs bellowed again, and took a menacing step toward the lights. But it was half-hearted. They clearly didn't like being around these moving sources. After a moment, they shuffled off, the lights following them, driving them away past the tennis courts.
Thorne moved forward.
He heard Harding say, "Doc? Better get out of there, before they decide to come back."
Thorne moved quickly toward the lights. He found himself standing beside Levine and Harding. They were swinging fistfuls of flashlights back and forth.
They all went back to the store.
Inside, Levine slammed the door shut, and sagged back against it. "I was never so frightened in my entire life."
"Richard," Harding said coldly. "Get a grip on yourself." She crossed the room, and placed the flashlights on the counter.
"Going out there was insane," Levine said, wiping his forehead. He was drenched in sweat, his shirt stained dark.
"Actually, it was a slam dunk," Harding said. She turned to Thorne. "You could see they had a refractory period for skin response. It's fast compared to, say, an octopus, but it's still there. My assumption was that those dinosaurs were like all animals that rely on camouflage. They're basically ambushers. They're not particularly fast or active. They stand motionless for hours in an unchanging environment, disappearing into the background, and they wait until some unsuspecting meal comes along. But if they have to keep adjusting to new light conditions, they know they can't hide. They get anxious. And if they get anxious enough, they finally just run away. Which is what happened."
Levine turned and glared angrily at Thorne. "This was all your fault. If you hadn't gone out there that way, just wandering off - "
"Richard," Harding said, cutting him off. "We need gas or we'll never get out of here. Don't you want to get out of here?"
Levine said nothing. He sulked.
"Well," Thorne said, "there wasn't any gas in the shed anyway."
"Hey, everybody," Sarah said. "Look who's here!"
Arby came forward, leaning on Kelly. He had changed into clothes from the store: a pair of swimming trunks and a tee shirt that said "InGen Bioengineering Labs" and beneath, "We Make The Future."
Arby had a black eye, a swollen cheekbone, and a cut that Harding had bandaged on his forehead. His arms and legs were badly bruised. But he was walking, and he managed a crooked smile.
Thorne said, "How do you feel, son?"
Arby said, "You know what I want more than anything, right now?"
"What?" Thorne said.
"Diet Coke," Arby said. "And a lot of aspirin."
Sarah bent over Malcolm. He was humming softly, staring upward. "How is Arby?" he asked.
"He'll be okay."
"Does he need any morphine?" Malcolm asked.
"No, I don't think so."
"Good," Malcolm said. He stretched out his arm, rolling up the sleeve.
Thorne cleaned the nest out of the microwave, and heated up some canned beef stew. He found a package of paper plates decorated in a Halloween motif - pumpkins and bats - and spooned the food onto the plates. The two kids ate hungrily.
He gave a plate to Sarah, then turned to Levine. "What about you?"
Levine was staring out the window. "No."
Thorne shrugged.
Arby came over, holding his plate. "Is there any more?"
"Sure," Thorne said. He gave him his own plate.
Levine went over and sat with Malcolm. Levine said, "Well, at least we were right about one thing. This island was a true lost world - a pristine, untouched ecology. We were right from the beginning."
Malcolm looked over, and raised his head. "Are you joking?" he said. "What about all the dead apatosaurs?"
"I've been thinking about that," Levine said. "The raptors killed them, obviously. And then the raptors - "
"Did what? Malcolm said. "Dragged them to their nest? Those animals weigh hundreds of tons, Richard. A hundred raptors couldn't drag them. No, no." He sighed. "The carcasses must have floated to a bend in the river, where they beached. The raptors made their nest at a source of convenient food supply - dead apatosaurs."
"Well, possibly..."
"But why so many dead apatosaurs, Richard? Why do none of the animals attain adulthood? And why are there so many predators on the island?"
"Well. We need more data, of course - " Levine began.
"No, we don't," Malcolm said. "Didn't you go through the lab? We already know the answer."
"What is it?" Levine said, irritably.
"Prions," Malcolm said, closing his eyes.
Levine frowned. "What're prions?"
Malcolm sighed.
"Ian," Levine said, "What are prions?"
"Go away," Malcolm said, waving his hand.
Arby was curled up in a cornet, near sleep. Thorne rolled up a tee shirt, and put it under the boy's head. Arby mumbled something, and smiled.
In a few moments, he began to snore.
Thorne got up and went over to Sarah, who was standing by the window. Outside, the sky was beginning to lighten above the trees, turning pale blue.
"How much time now?" she said.
Thorne looked at his watch. "Maybe an hour."
She started to pace. "We've got to get gas," she said. "If we have gas we can drive the Jeep to the helicopter site."
"But there's no gas," Thorne said.
"There must be some, somewhere." She continued to pace. "You tried the pumps...."
"Yes, They're dry."
"What about inside the lab?"
"I don't think so."
"Where else? What about the trailer?"
Thorne shook his head. "It's just a passive tow-trailer. The other unit has an auxiliary generator and some gas tanks. But it went over the cliff."
"Maybe the tanks didn't rupture when it fell. We still have the motorcycle. Maybe I can go out there and - "
"Sarah," he said.
"It's worth a try."
"Sarah - "
From the window, Levine said softly, "Heads up. We have visitors."
Good Mother
In the predawn light, the dinosaurs came out of the bushes and went directly toward the Jeep. There were six of them, big brown duckbills fifteen feet high, with curving snouts.
"Maiasaurs," Levine said, "I didn't know there were any here." "What are they doing?"
The huge animals clustered around the jeep, and immediately began to tear it apart. One ripped away the canvas top. Another poked at the roll bar, rocking the vehicle back and forth.
"I don't understand," Levine said. "They're hadrosaurs. Herbivores. This aggressiveness is quite uncharacteristic."
"Uh-huh," Thorne said. As they watched, the maiasaurs tipped the jeep over. The vehicle crashed over on its side. One of the adults reared up, and stood on the side panels. Its huge feet crushed the vehicle inward.
But when the Jeep fell over, two white Styrofoam cases tumbled out onto the ground. The maiasaurs seemed to be focused on these cases. They nipped at the Styrofoam, tossing chunks of white around the ground. They moved hurriedly, in a kind of frenzy.
"Something to eat?" Levine said. "Some kind of dinosaur catnip? What?"
Then the top of one case tore away, and they saw a cracked egg inside. Protruding from the egg was a wrinkled bit of flesh. The maiasaurs slowed. Their movements were now cautious, gentle. They honked and grunted. The big bodies of the animals blocked their view.
There was a squeaking sound.
"You're kidding," Levine said.
On the ground, a tiny animal moved about. Its body was pale brown, almost white. It tried to stand, but flopped down at once. It was barely a foot long, with wrinkled folds of flesh around its neck. In a moment, a second animal tumbled out beside it.
Harding sighed.
Slowly, one of the maiasaurs ducked its huge head down, and gently scooped the baby up in its broad bill. It kept its mouth open as it raised its head. The baby sat calmly on the adult's tongue, looking around with its tiny head as it rose high into the air.
The second baby was picked up. The adults milled around for a moment, as if unsure whether there was more to do, and then, honking loudly, they all moved off.
Leaving behind a crumpled, shattered vehicle.
Thorne said, "I guess gas is no longer a problem."
"I guess not," Sarah said.
Thorne stared at the wreckage of the Jeep, shaking his head. "It's worse than a head-on collision," he said. "It looks like it's been put in a compactor. Just wasn't built for those sorts of stresses."
Levine snorted. "Engineers in Detroit didn't expect a five-ton animal to stand on it."
"You know," Thorne said, "I would have liked to see how our own car stood up under that."
"You mean, because we beefed it up?"
"Yes," Thorne said. "We really built it to take fantastic stresses. Huge stresses. Ran it through computer programs, added those honeycomb panels, the whole - "
"Wait a minute," Harding said, turning away from the window. "What are you talking about?"
"The other car," Thorne said.
"What other car?"
"The car we brought," he said. "The Explorer."
"Of course!" she said, suddenly excited. "There's another car! I completely forgot! The Explorer!"
"Well, it's history now," Thorne said. "It shorted out last night, when I was coming back to the trailer. I ran it through a puddle and it shorted out."
"So? Maybe it still - "
"No," Thorne said, shaking his head. "A short like that'd blow the VR. It's an electric car. It's dead."
"I'm surprised you don't have circuit breakers for that."
"Well, we never used to put them in, although on this latest version...He trailed off. He shook his head. "I can't believe it."
"The car has circuit breakers?"
"Yes, Eddie put them in, last minute."
"So the car might still run?"
"Yes, it probably would, if you reset the breakers."
"Where is it?" she said. She was heading for the motorcycle.
"I left it on that side road that runs from the ridge road down to the hide. But Sarah - "
"It's our only chance," she said. She pulled on her radio headset, adjusted the microphone to her cheek, and rolled the motorcycle to the door. "Call me," she said. "I'm going to go find us a car."
They watched through the windows. In the early-morning light, she climbed onto the motorcycle, and roared off up the hill.
Levine watched her go. "What do you figure her odds are?"
Thorne just shook his head.
The radio crackled. "Doc."
Thorne picked it up. "Yes, Sarah."
"I'm coming up the hill now. I see...there's six of them."
"Raptors?"
"Yeah. They're, uh...Listen. I'm going to try another path. I see a - "
The radio crackled.
"Sarah?" She was breaking up.
" - sort of a game trail that - here - think I better - "
"Sarah," Thorne said. "You're breaking up."
" - do now. So just - ish me luck.."
Over the radio, they heard the hum of the bike. Then they heard another sound, which might have been an animal snarl, and might have been more static. Thorne bent forward, holding the radio close to his ear. Then, abruptly, the radio clicked and was silent. He said, "Sarah?"
There was no answer.
"Maybe she turned it off," Levine said.
Thorne shook his head. "Sarah?"
Nothing.
"Sarah? Are you there?"
They waited.
Nothing.
"Hell," Thorne said.
Time passed slowly, Levine stood by the window, staring out. Kelly was snoring in a corner. Arby lay next to Malcolm, fast asleep. And Malcolm was humming tunelessly.
Thorne sat on the floor in the center of the room, leaning back against the checkout Counter. Every so often, he'd pick up the radio and try to call Sarah, but there was never any answer. He tried all six channels. There was no answer on any of them.
Eventually he stopped trying.
The radio crackled. " - ate these damned things. Never work right." A grunt. "Can't figure out what - things - damn."
Across the room, Levine sat forward.
Thorne grabbed the radio. "Sarah? Sarah?"
"Finally," she said, her voice crackling. "Where the hell have you been, Doc?"
"Are you all right?"
"Of course I'm all right."
"There's something wrong with your radio. You're breaking up."
"Yeah? What should I do?"
"Try screwing down the cover on your battery pack. It's probably loose."
"No. I mean, what should I do about the car?"
Thorne said, "What?"
"I'm at the car, Doc, I'm there. What should I do?"
Levine glanced at his watch. "Twenty minutes until the helicopter arrives, " he said. "You know, she just might make it."
Dodgson
Dodgson awoke, aching and stiff, on the floor of the concrete utility shed. He got to his feet, and looked out the window. He saw streaks of red in a pale-blue sky. He opened the door to the utility shed, and went outside.
He was very thirsty, and his body was sore. He started walking beneath the canopy of trees. The 'tingle around him was silent in the early morning. He needed water. More than anything, he needed water. Somewhere off to his left, he heard the soft gurgle of a stream. He headed toward it, moving more quickly.
Through the trees, he could see the sky growing lighter. He knew that Malcolm and his party were still here. They must have some plan to get off the island. If they could get off, he could too.
He came over a low rise, and looked down at a gully and a flowing stream. It looked clear. He hurried down toward it, wondering if it was polluted. He decided he didn't care. Just before he reached the stream, he tripped over a vine and fell, swearing.
He got to his feet, and looked back. Then he saw it wasn't a vine he had tripped over.
It was the strap of a green backpack.
Dodgson tugged at the strap, and the whole backpack slid out of the foliage. The pack had been torn apart, and it was crusty with dried blood. As he pulled it, the contents clattered out among the ferns. Flies were buzzing everywhere. But he saw a camera, a metal case for food, and a plastic water bottle. He searched quickly through the surrounding ferns. But he didn't find much else, except some soggy candy bars.
Dodgson drank the water, and then realized he was very hungry. He popped open the metal case, hoping for some decent food. But the case didn't contain food. It was filled with foam packing.
And in the center of the packing was a radio.
He flicked it on. The battery light glowed strongly. He flicked from one channel to another, hearing static.
Then a man's voice. "Sarah? This is Thorne. Sarah."
After a moment, a woman's voice: "Doc. Did you hear me? I said, I'm at the car."
Dodgson listened, and smiled.
So there was a car.
In the store, Thorne held the radio close to his cheek. "Okay," he said.
Sarah? Listen carefully. Get in the car, and do exactly what I tell you."
"Okay fine," she said. "But tell me first. Is Levine there?"
"He's here."
The radio clicked. She said, "Ask him if there's any danger from a green dinosaur that's about six feet tall and has a domed forehead."
Levine nodded. "Tell her yes. They're called pachycephalosaurs."
"He says yes," Thorne said. "They're pachycephalo-somethings, and you should be careful. Why?"
"Because there's about fifty of them, all around the car."
Explorer
The Explorer was sitting in the middle of a shady section of the road, with overhanging trees above. The car had stopped just beyond a depression, where there had no doubt been a large puddle the night before. Now the puddle had become a mudhole, thanks to the dozen or so animals that sat in it, splashed in it, drank from it, and rolled at its edges. These were the green dome-headed dinosaurs that she had been watcing for the last few minutes, trying to decide what to do. Because not only were they near the mudhole, they were also located in front of the car, and around the sides of the car.
She had watched the pachycephalosaurs with uneasiness. Harding had spent a lot of time on the ground with wild animals, but usually animals she knew well. From long experience, she knew how closely she could approach, and under what circumstances. If this were a herd of wildebeest, she would walk right in without hesitation. If it were a herd of American buffalo, she would be cautious, but she'd still go in. And if it was a herd of African buffalo, she wouldn't go anywhere near them.
She pushed the microphone against her cheek and said, "How much time left?"
"Twenty minutes."
"Then I better get in there," she said. "Any ideas?"
There was a pause. The radio crackled.
"Levine says nobody knows anything about these animals, Sarah."
"Great."
"Levine says a complete skeleton has never been recovered. So nobody has even a guess about their behavior, except that they're probably aggressive.
"Great," she said.
She was looking at the situation of the car, and the overhanging trees. It was a shady area, peaceful and quiet in the early-morning light.
The radio crackled. "Levine says you might try walking slowly in, and see if the herd lets you through. But no quick movements, no sudden gestures."
She stared at the animals and thought: They have those domed heads for a reason.
"No thanks," she said. "I'm going to try something else."
"What?"
In the store, Levine said, "What'd she say?"
"She said she was going to try something else."
"Like what?" Levine said. He went to the window and looked out. The sky was growing lighter. He frowned. There was some consequence to that, he thought. Something he knew in the back of his mind, but wasn't thinking about.
Something about daylight...
And territory.
Territory.
Levine looked out at the sky again, trying to put it together. What difference did it make that daylight was coming? He shook his head, gave it up for the moment. "How long to reset the breakers?"
"Just a minute or two," Thorne said.
"Then there might still be time," Levine said.
There was static hiss from the radio, and they heard Harding say, "Okay, I'm above the car."
"You're where?"
"I'm above the car," she said. "In a tree."
Harding climbed out on the branch, moving farther from the trunk, feeling it bend under her weight. The branch seemed supple. She was now ten feet above the car, swinging lower. Few of the animals below had looked up at her, but the herd seemed to be restless. Animals sitting in the mud got up, and began to turn and mill. She saw their tails flicking back and forth anxiously.
She moved farther out, and the branch bent lower. It was slippery from the night's rain. She tried to gauge her position above the car. It looked pretty good, she thought.
Suddenly, one of the animals charged the trunk of the tree she was in, butting it hard. The impact was surprisingly forceful. The tree swayed, her branch swinging up and down, while she struggled to hold on.
Oh shit, she thought.
She rose up into the air, came down again, and then she lost her grip. Her hands slipped on wet leaves and wet bark, and she fell free. At the last moment, she saw that she would miss the car entirely. Then she hit the ground, landing hard in muddy earth.
Right beside the animals.
The radio crackled. "Sarah?" Thorne said.
There was no answer.
"What's she doing now?" Levine began to pace nervously. "I wish we could see what she's doing."
In the corner of the room, Kelly got up, rubbing her eyes. "Why don't you use the video?"
Thorne said, "What video?"
Kelly pointed to the cash register. "'That's a computer."
"It is?"
"Yeah. I think so."
Kelly yawned as she sat in the chair facing the cash register. It looked like a dumb terminal, which meant it probably didn't have access to much, but it was worth a try anyway. She turned it on. Nothing happened. She flicked the power switch back and forth. Nothing.
Idly, she swung her legs, and kicked a wire beneath the table. She bent over and saw that the terminal was unplugged. So she plugged it in.
The screen glowed, and a single word appeared:
LOGIN:
To proceed further, she knew she needed a password. Arby had a password. She glanced over and saw that he was still asleep. She didn't want to wake him up. She remembered that he had written it down on a piece of paper and stuck it in his pocket. Maybe it was still in his clothes she thought. She crossed the room, found the bundle of his wet, muddy clothes, and began going through the pockets. She found his wallet, the keys to his house, and some other stuff. Finally she found a piece of paper in his back pocket. It was damp, and streaked with mud. The ink had smeared, but she could still read his writing:
VIG/&*849/
Kelly took the paper and went back to the computer. She typed in all the characters carefully, and pressed the return key. The screen went blank, and then a new screen came up. She was surprised. It was different from the screen she had seen earlier, in the trailer.
She was in the system. But the whole thing looked different. Maybe because this wasn't the radionet, she thought. She must be logged into the actual laboratory system. It had more graphics because the terminal was hard-wired. Maybe they even ran optical pipe out here.
Across the room, Levine said, "Kelly? How about it?"
"I'm working on it," she said,
Cautiously, she began to type. Rows of icons appeared rapidly across the screen, one after another.
She knew she was looking at a graphic interface of some kind, but the meaning of the images wasn't obvious to her, and there were no explanations. The people who had used this system were probably trained to know what the images meant. But Kelly didn't know. She wanted to get into the video system, yet none of the pictures suggested anything to do with video. She moved the cursor around, wondering what to do.
She decided she'd have to guess. She picked the diamond-shaped icon on the lower left, and clicked on it.
"Uh-oh," she said, alarmed.
Levine looked over. "Something wrong?"
"No," she said. "It's fine." She quickly clicked on the header, and got back to the previous screen. This time she tried one of the triangularshaped icons.
The screen changed again:
That's it, she thought. Immediately the image popped off, and the actual video images began to flash up on the screen. On this little cash register monitor, the pictures were tiny, but now she was in familiar territory, and she moved around quickly, moving the cursor, manipulating the images.
"What are you looking for?" she said.
"The Explorer," Thorne said.
She clicked the screen. The image zoomed up. "Got it," she said.
Levine said, "You do?" He sounded surprised.