Shenandoah (2 page)

Sitting there watching the fire he rubbed his head… if he could only remember…  He couldn’t even remember his own name.  It was frustrating.  As he sat warming by the fire, he finally felt that he had healed enough that he was going to try to hike out of the forest.  He knew it wasn’t going to be easy, especially since he didn’t have a clue where he was.   He hoped that with the snow the dinosaurs would be easier to spot and he could avoid them.  He also knew that in the colder temperatures some dinosaurs hibernated like bears but there were others that didn’t.  He wasn’t sure if this was the way dinosaurs actually were or if the genetic mutations were the cause of it.  It still amazed him that he knew all this information about dinosaurs but didn’t even know who he was. Finally he decided that he would just pick a name and go with it.  John Doe was just as good as any other name to him at that point.  He needed a name to call himself in case he got into an argument with himself.  Thinking about this, John chuckled to himself.

Frustrated, John went outside to check the snares he had set up. He had about five different ones set up.  This morning, however, he didn’t have any luck and they were all empty.  It took him about two hours to check all of them and then he came back to the cave where he was staying.  Instead of going into the cave, John used the hunting knife he had with him and cut a small one inch diameter branch that was about six feet long.  He trimmed the smaller branches off and then took rope and attached the knife to the pole.  Hopefully with his crudely fashioned spear he might have some luck spearing a fish in the nearby stream.

Although it felt like he had tried the spear a thousand times, he had only tried it a few times when he was successful. He managed to spear a small brook trout.  It wasn’t a big fish but it was a start.  With renewed interest he attacked the spear fishing with more vigor.  In about two hours he had enough fish to eat for the next two or three days.  Smiling, he finally decided to stop.  The fish were all different species of trout but mostly brook trout.  He cleaned them and took them back to his cave. 

“John, you are going to have some good eating tonight,” said John smiling broadly as he made his way to his home. 

Upon arriving there he decided there were still a few hours of daylight left and he wanted to make sure he had enough wood to last him for the next few days.  It was starting to snow and it looked like he might be stuck here for a while.  He worked until dark loading his little cave with wood.  The snow was deepening so he retired to the cave and closed up the entrance.

He was ravenous from working but wanting to conserve his supply, he decided to only cook one of the fish.  He picked a good sized rainbow trout and roasted it over the fire.  Satisfied, he lay back, wrapped up in his thermal blanket, and was immediately asleep. 

Chapter 5

Kim and Wynd watched Jocelyn fly the drone around the crash site.  It was really hard to see anything new about the crash area.  It had been over two weeks and it had snowed a couple of times in that time.  It was even worse considering that there had been a fresh blanket of snow added to it the previous night.  Kim and Wynd were determined and decided not to let that deter them from continuing the search.  The helicopter crash covered an area of about a hundred feet.  The tail boom was about twenty-five feet from the cockpit.  The main rotor was bent, broken, and scattered over the entire length of the clearing.  Although mostly intact, the cockpit was bent and crumpled.  The landing skids were sheared off and nowhere to be seen and the tail rotor was also missing.  Broken trees and tree limbs were laying everywhere in this area.

The snow was making it difficult but they circled the helicopter cockpit over and over again.  Finally they gave up on it and enlarged the search to the edges of the clearing. They saw several different fresh tracks of deer and also a couple of tracks of a large dinosaur.  It was probably the t-rex that they had seen in the area. 

As they scanned around the southwest corner of the clearing Kim noticed something on the side of one of the larger oak trees.  There was a large clump of snow on the side of the tree.  It looked like an odd shaped knot but she wasn’t sure.

“Jocelyn, bring the drone in closer to the trunk of that large oak and zoom in,” ordered Kim.

Slowly the drone moved in closer to the trunk.  When it was just a few feet away, the camera zoomed in on a lower portion of the tree.

“Not that low, Jocelyn.  Do you see that clump of snow on the side?” asked Kim.

“Affirmative,” said Jocelyn.

“Center your camera on that snow and zoom in,” said Kim.

The camera slowly zoomed in on the area.  Kim got up and walked over to the screen.  She squinted to try and see it better.

“What is that?” she said quietly to herself.

Still squinting, all of the sudden her eyes opened wide. 

“It’s a camera!  A game camera!” exclaimed Kim.

Wynd jumped up and moved in beside her. 

“What are you talking about?” asked Wynd.

“It’s a game camera. Hunters use those in the woods to track game.  It starts filming anytime there is movement,” said Kim as she looked even closer. “Jocelyn, can you identify this camera?”

“Yes.  The camouflage camera you are looking at is the BPS Solar Force Game Cam 7000 with audio.  It is the satellite connected model.  The pictures and videos it takes are uploaded to the internet and stored on a server.  Once movement is detected, the camera will roll for the next thirty minutes.  The owner can view the video on the internet without ever traveling back to the camera,” said Jocelyn.

Kim was jumping with excitement. 

“Is it active?” asked Kim eagerly.

“Affirmative,” said Jocelyn.

“Could you…” Kim started to ask a question but was interrupted by Jocelyn.

“I’m already working on it,” said Jocelyn.  “Hold on…  I have gone back to the time stamp indexed at the time of the crash.  Prepare yourself.  The video is disturbing.  Are you ready for me to proceed?”

Kim and Wynd looked at each other for a moment and then they both agreed to proceed.

Chapter 6

The video started and they could tell that something was happening.  The tree the camera was attached to was moving.  Jocelyn had the video rolling at half the normal speed.  They wanted to be sure that they didn’t miss anything.  In slow motion, debris started falling from the sky.  It was small limbs at first then it was larger limbs and chunks of wood falling. Then there was a blinding flash and you could see parts of the helicopter falling.

It increased with intensity as the debris started cluttering the whole screen.  The noise on the video was deafening.  Then the helicopter came into view.  The tail boom broke off and flew across the camera.  The crumpled cockpit, along with sheared off landing skids, tree limbs, and large pieces of wood struck the ground in a horrifying crash.  The cockpit was upside down. Some slight smoke started drifting up from the helicopter.  It took several minutes for everything to settle down. 

Kim looked at Wynd with a worried look. Although it was only a matter of minutes, they waited for what seemed an eternity.  The time stamp showed that it had been fifteen minutes.  There was still no more movement. Wynd was biting her lip and Kim was wringing her hands. While they were waiting, Virg, Danielle, David, Lauren, Bob, and Deanna had slipped in behind them. Bob and Deanna were the two individuals they had rescued with David. No one said anything.  They just watched with the same intensity as Kim and Wynd.

All at once Danielle screamed, “It moved!”

Then the others started jumping and saying, “It is moving!”

Kim and Wynd still held their composure because they both remembered the blood.  The cockpit was moving.  They couldn’t see inside of it but it was obvious that something was going on inside.  Then they heard a man yell in pain.  Wynd brought her hands to her face.  It was Marcus and he was in pain.  There was more movement, the cockpit shook, and then Marcus screamed out in pain again.  Wynd’s lip was quivering.  It was all she could do to hold it in. 

The cockpit was moving slightly again and then they all heard the thumping coming from the forest.  They heard the tyrannosaur roar before it came into the clearing.  Everyone watching was holding their breath in fear.

Wynd let out a whimper as she saw Marcus crawl out of the overturned cockpit.

“No, no, no, no, no.  Marcus, run, run, run…” said Wynd crying.  Marcus was in bad shape.  He was bleeding from several different places and he seemed to be favoring his shoulder.  As he struggled to his feet, the huge tyrannosaurus crashed through the edge of the crash site smashing trees in the process. 

The girls all started screaming when it broke through.  David yelled at them.

“Look,” he said as he pointed at the deer that was just in front of the t-rex.  The tyrannosaur struck the fleeing doe with surprising speed.  As the t-rex crunched down on the fleeing deer, it raised its head and shook the deer.  Blood was running down the jaws of the dinosaur as it began to eat it.  Wynd started jumping up and down pointing at Marcus. 

“He’s getting away! He’s getting away!” she screamed as she watched Marcus slowly sneak out of the picture and into the forest.

The video continued as the tyrannosaur walked around finishing its meal at the crash site.  The big monster was still dripping blood as it sniffed around the crash site.  It stayed about ten more minutes and then went back the way it came.

Chapter 7

John woke up and started tending the fire.  It didn’t feel as cold as it was the day before.  After he got the fire blazing again, he got up and walked toward the entrance of the cave.  It was then that he realized why it was a little warmer.  It had snowed another foot of snow in the night and it was still coming down hard.  The snow was insulating his cave and keeping the heat in.  There was no use in going out in that.  He sat back down by the fire and began to concentrate on his situation.

His memory was clearing back to the time of the crash but still nothing before that.  He gathered his thoughts and went back to what had happened in the last seven days….

John slowly gained consciousness.  Bringing his right hand to his aching head, he glanced around at his surroundings.  He was hanging upside down in a harness in what looked like the inside of a helicopter.  He had a good sized knot on the top of his head and as he felt his left eye, he winced with pain.  It was almost swollen shut.  He had a lot of scratches on his arms and there were several places on his body that were bleeding. Although he was very sore and hurting, he didn’t think anything was overly serious.  He did think that his left shoulder was out of joint.  Other than that, he didn’t think there was anything broken.  Taking his knife from the scabbard on his belt, John started working on cutting himself out of the harness.  He cut his right shoulder strap and his right side dropped but he caught as the left held.  He screamed out in pain.  Taking a minute to gather himself, John waited a few seconds before starting again.  One thing he noticed was that when the left strap held, it had popped his shoulder back into place.  Finally ready, he cut the rest of the straps and fell to the ceiling of the helicopter.  He screamed in pain again.  He lay there for a few minutes and looked around the cockpit.  Easing himself up, he looked around the pilot’s area of the helicopter.  He found a compartment with a ready bag.  The bag had flares, thermal blanket, rain gear, and a .45 automatic.

He was still looking when he felt a slight vibration.  The vibration kept feeling stronger.  Something was coming and it was big.  Although there wasn’t a fire, there was a smoky haze from the crash.  John moved over and kicked the door of the helicopter three times until he was able to get it open.  It was then that John heard the enormous roar of a tyrannosaurus rex coming that way.  It couldn’t be over fifty yards away.  He struggled and finally made it to his feet and picked up the bag.  The t-rex was almost on him by then. He tried to run but he was struggling.  He glanced back and realized why it had been coming so fast.  The t-rex was chasing a deer. At the edge of the clearing near the helicopter, the t-rex caught the deer and his big jaws clamped shut on the frightened deer.  The t-rex raised his head and shook it.  Blood was running down the jaws of the t-rex as it began to eat the deer. 

Marcus used this distraction to quietly slip away.  It was slow going but he kept a steady pace to put distance between him and the dinosaur.  He had only gone about a mile when he began to feel woozy and fell.  He needed somewhere to rest because he had lost more blood than he thought.  As he forced himself to his feet, he looked around for some kind of protection.  There was a small mountain stream running through the forest to his right.  He began forward again.  Up ahead he was able to see that the trees were thinner and then he noticed the rocky area.  There were several giant rocks and boulders in this area.  Some were at least twenty or twenty five feet tall.  As he got closer, he saw several smaller boulders at the base of the large ones.  As he reached these, he saw an opening to what looked like a small cave.  Although the entrance was tight, he was able to squeeze through the entrance into the small cave.  Taking a light from the bag, he scanned the inside and quickly moved some small boulders into place to help block the entrance.  The interior of the cave was spinning.  It was all he could do to maintain consciousness.  Although there were several rocks and branches on the base of the cave, John was able to find a flat spot and lie down.  He hastily gathered some wood that was near him, used the flare to start a fire, took the thermal blanket from the bag, and wrapped himself in it.  He had barely covered himself when he passed out. 

When he awoke it was bitterly cold and the middle of the night.  Although the blanket kept him from freezing, the fire hadn’t lasted long.  He remembered seeing several old larger limbs just on the outside of the cave.  Using those he started the fire again.  He checked himself over and it looked like that most of the bleeding had stopped.