Crucible of a Species (23 page)

Blunted front toes of the defenders flailed when an attacker drew too close but they did little more than annoy the deadly predators. Soon gaping holes began to open in the defensive ring as the coordinated attacks of the hunters renewed, methodically dragging defender after defender to their deaths in the open field. Somehow, with the loss of each herbivore, the dwindling ring of grass-eaters managed to reform and hold under the instinctive knowledge that open flight would be a worse fate.

The hadrosaur’s defensive ring tightened and held as the attackers began to tire. One or two of the younger tyrannosaurs still circled and screamed at the cowering grass-eaters but now, for as long as the ring held fast, those inside would be safe. Soon even the youngsters grew tired of the game and moved off with the soft flowing grace of predatory cats.

The tyrannosaurs dragged their kill into the lower portion of the field and settled downwind of the hadrosaur herd for their meal. Smaller, weaker hunters circled, begging and pleading for scraps as they crossed the blood and gore soaked grass surrounding the feeding. Low rolling trills and hoots, mixed with an occasional sharp pain-filled screech that carried across the meadow. Youngsters twisted, danced and hopped in their excitement around the feasting. The hot scent of body fluids deepened across the open glade as knots of blood and gore flew through the air from the vicious feeding. Soon a whole section of the meadow lay covered in a grisly carpet of blood and shredded flesh. Bellies filled and even the weakest could grab the less tasty portions of meat. Smaller animals, scavengers such as troodon and velocipartors, began to appear at the edges of the blood-soaked grass. They darted in to snatch a loose piece of meat or bone, often drawing a threatening snap from some of the gorged and now very slow predators.

The hadrosaurs eventually broke from their ring and silently moved down river, away from the smells of death, fear, blood and anger that lingered in the glen. The group was a bit smaller now but still large enough to survive. The little pegomastax and his family moved with the hadrosaur herd. Once again, they too had managed to survive.

*~~*~~*~~*

Unnatural quiet descended
over the surrounding jungle after the attack, broken only by occasional low growls or the snapping of jaws that floated across the trampled grass as the bloated predators rested after their feast.

Four pairs of eyes watched silently from the dark recesses of a crude shelter hidden in the brush at the far end of the blood-soaked grassy field. These were eyes round and alien to the scene in the field. Silently they remained in the shadows, watching and studying the dissolution of the drama that had taken place before them. Perhaps a little eccentrically, their attention seemed to gloss over the majestic duel between the hunters and their grass-eating prey as commonplace. Instead, the deep intelligence behind these eyes focused on the smaller creatures that had been running within the bounds of the defensive ring of hadrosaurs.

“Judging by the fangs, I’d say the little guys are definitely meat eaters. Actually, from what I could see of their teeth in general and the three-toed foot structure, I would classify them as theropod dinosaurs. I’d say they were in the same general family as the tyrannosaurs.” Dr. Shieve mistakenly mumbled while entering notes into her logbook and absently scratching a point on her leg recently bitten by an insect. “Their presence is something I didn’t expect so the big question is, how are they going to complicate our harvesting one of the herd animals?”

Dr. Shieve sat back within the blind while brushing a few strands of blond hair from her forehead, “I’m no paleontologist but I think we’ve seen their fossils or at least something like them. My guess is that they are related to Pegomastax and that would make them omnivores. Similar to humans, they likely eat both meat and vegetables. Pegomastax was an animal that was supposed to be very intelligent, maybe even one of the smartest dinosaurs. We never suspected they would live so closely with the hadrosaur herd. Looks like a symbiosis between the two species. Did you notice how the one that called the initial alarm first drew pruning invitations from the hadrosaurs as it ran by them?”

“You mean when the big duckbills bowed down as the little ones approached?” Sergeant Steve Martel spoke up for the first time since climbing into their rough shelter.

“Yep, that was an invitation to climb aboard. If our little Pego wouldn’t have been running from those tyrannosaurs, then it probably would have darted right up onto the animal’s back and begun hunting through the hadrosaur’s down coat for parasites.”

Sandra rolled over to look toward the marine sergeant sitting beside her. He wore his wide-brimmed, crumpled hat perched on his head even in the cover of the hide. The fabric was faded and wrinkled from years of use in the sun and rain of a much older star. “What’s more important, Sarge, is that they acted like an early warning sentry for the larger herd animals. That one’s alarm gave the herd time to form a defensive ring. Lord knows how they’ll react if they see us moving in on the herd.”

“By the way, Sergeant, for as big as they are those predators weren’t Tyrannosaurus Rex, they were a smaller member of the family called Albertosaurus although none of the fossils we’ve found come from this far south. If we bump into T-Rex, we’re going to see that we have even bigger problems on our hands but fortunately they won’t be around for another thirty or so million years.”

“Yeah? Well, the duckbills aren’t anything to ignore either. I don’t know what the hell they were doing but it sure seemed to work.”

Sandra noticed that, even as he spoke, the sergeant’s eyes never stopped scanning the fields ahead or the darkened jungle behind their small group. She turned her attention back to one of the wounded predators; it had fallen and was still trying to get back up using its stubby front arms. A new respect grew in her for the duckbilled animals that she had always considered defenseless.

She lifted the binoculars up to her eyes and scanned the herd of grass-eaters now leaving the open meadow, “Sound, Sergeant. I think they used ultra-low frequency blasts of sound to defend themselves. We always wondered if that hollow boney horn on the heads of the hadrosaurs was a sounding chamber. Those who suggested it thought it might be for mating calls. I don’t believe anyone ever considered they would use it as their primary defensive weapon.”

The journalist slipped one hand behind his head to scratch at a bite on the back of his neck as he spoke up, “This whole thing keeps getting better-and-better doesn’t it? I guess this puts the kibosh on our plan to get some hadrosaur steak for Cookie to try and grill. We’ll never get near the herd after what just happened. They’re gonna be jumpy as hell.”

“We could wait and see if the tyrannosaurs leave some scraps.” Ensign Petrika offered. Susan looked up at him and wrinkled her nose.

“Oh come on Dr. Shieve,” Martel countered, obviously enjoying himself. “It wouldn’t be that awful. Cookie could cut off any of the badly slimed pieces and I’m sure you’d never know the difference …. or, at least I think he’d do that. Sometimes I wonder. On second thought, it might be good to stay away from any soup or stews for a while.

“Even if we go after the leftovers then we’d still have to worry about the scavengers. Look real careful-like around the bottom of that bush out there with the tufts of white on its branches, about fifty feet out from where the older predators are sleeping. See the uneven bunching in the grass? That’s a pack of scavengers. They’re waiting and you can bet your uncle’s green turban that they’re gonna grab that piece as soon as the youngster’s attention slips.

“On the other hand, we may be even better off than you think. Were you watching when the herd packed up and left the field? There were two youngsters hurt in the ruckus but still able to keep up with the others. With any luck, we can get to them before any of the scavengers. We simply need to hustle a bit and ketch up to the herd. In any case I want to be far away from here by the time any of the big predators start moving around again.”

“We can’t follow them hoping that one will drop over dead,” Dr. Shieve protested. “That could take us miles away and involve several days of tracking.”

“You’re right, Doctor. What’s more, if they’re carrying wounded, then other predators are eventually going to get the scent and we’d soon be in the same situation that we have here. Actually, I don’t think we’ll need to wait that long,” the marine commented with a slight smile as he patted his rifle. “We’ll simply speed up the process but we need to do it soon while all the bad guys are still sitting and licking their chops here in this field as they wait for the big ones to finish eating.”

“Okay, I guess that makes sense but why does it have to be one of the young-ones? There were older ones in the group that were wounded.” Dr. Shieve pleaded.

“We’ll make that decision when we get to a point that we can take a shot. Given a choice, I’d rather take a young one. Even with a youngster there’s gonna be more meat than we can carry out of here and the meat should be more tender that that of an older animal.”

Dr. Shieve picked up her backpack but felt she had to cut one last jibe at the sergeant, “I hope you aren’t too disappointed with the steaks we get. Dinosaurs aren’t reptiles but neither are they mammals. Dinos are more closely related to birds and the hadrosaurid species is actually in the same family tree as our modern birds.”

“Gotcha, Doc. You’re tellin’ me that it’ll probably taste like chicken instead of steak. I can live with that, let’s get going.”

They crawled back out of the brush-hidden hide and Sandra stretched to look up at the steep red and yellow cliffs bordering both sides of the river valley. The air was cooler here under the mixed high palm leafy shrubs near the face of the cliff.

Sandra continued her stretch, turning towards Sgt. Martel as he settled his faded hat back onto his head and began working the cramps out of his legs. Completing her stretch, she swung her pack onto her shoulders and picked up her Pulsar, “Okay, keep your eyes open, speak only if you must. Sensors say the path should be clear but keep alert anyway.”

Sandra took a step to start down the path when she felt a touch on her shoulder and turned to see a smile spread across the sun-tanned face nestled under a wide hat brim as he pushed in front of her to take the lead. Sandra turned so that the marine couldn’t see her face flush as she quietly chided herself,
Great! You just told a marine sergeant to take second seat and keep on his toes
. Her face turned an even deeper red when she noticed the broad smile beaming on the face of the journalist.

The jungle that had been so eerily quiet after the killing was slowly returning to normal as the intensity of the calls around them grew. Sergeant Martel took them the long way around the edge of the meadow to the area where the herd had passed, careful to follow the more difficult path inside of the tree line knowing it would be fatal to attract the attention of the scavengers still out in the open field. His dark blue eyes watched ahead and along the dense growth at their side as he led them onward. The sergeant’s movements were cautious, ever aware of the placement of every step for fear of crawling threats beneath his feet or the sharp snap of a twig under a boot that would alert some unseen horror to their passage.

Sandra shifted her rifle as she climbed over a fallen tree. She stopped for a moment to look up at the clear blue, cloudless sky through a hole in the green canopy above. Once again, she lowered her eyes to scan the jungle around her and listened
.

A tap on her shoulder startled her.

“Come on Sandra, stop daydreaming and keep moving.” Ensign Petrika whispered as he urged her onward.

The team cautiously followed the path out into a small clearing. This whole situation was beyond anything Sandra had expected. There were stretches of the trail where everything seemed so normal. She could hear a brook nearby softly passing over the rocks. Pockets of root-beer like foam collected around small branches lying in the clear, gurgling waters. Bugs were bugs. Insects buzzed and flew around her head as they did on any other summer day. Some, like the grasshoppers and dragonflies, were a bit larger than she was used to seeing but still, they acted like bugs.

The human mind expects to see an occasional soft, brown fuzzy rabbit or maybe even a beautiful grouse or pheasant scurry out from the path. Here a single misplaced step resulted in a knee-high monstrosity covered in fur-like down, bounding out of the grass as it screams at you with a mouth full of sharp teeth before running off down through the brush to safety.

The humans easily followed the deeply trodden path taken by the herd of three-to-four ton herbivorous dinosaurs. The trick was to be able to identify and keep track of the wounded animals, making sure they wouldn’t lose it if it should separate from the group during the last moments of life. The trail led the four humans downriver, past high buttes and under ancient gingko trees, seed ferns, club mosses and through a strange swamp covered with ancient horsetail reeds that rose tall into the air above their heads. Below their feet, the path changed from a sandy, pebble-filled mixture into a deep black loam that covered the floor in this section of the valley. Familiar insects filled the air with their incessant buzzing.

They entered a second meadow full of the simple pedaled flowers of the Cretaceous, a small stream ran through it across the far end. Grass had taken over most of the meadow, pushing out the older varieties of pine, ginkgo and palm still abundant elsewhere from earlier Jurassic times. Dragonflies, the size of red-tail hawks, skipped along the surface of the stream on two pairs of iridescent wings that glistened with the colors of the rainbow in the sunlight. Here again, the landscape seemed almost home-like to the humans. Beech, fig, magnolia, and sassafras grew in clusters forming small islands of shrubs in the meadow and around its edges. Far off in the distance, on the opposite side of the field grazed the herd of hadrosaurs.