Once we reached the ships, Leo broke off from us and hurried over to his own craft.
“We will speak over radio!” he shouted as he ran to his doorway.
“Wait!” I yelled as we skidded to a halt beside the craft. “The forcefield!”
The male alien wasted no time with words, and he silently turned and ran back to Adhara’s craft. He leapt inside, and the protective shield vanished after a few moments. Then Leo raced back out, sent me a nod, and hurtled toward his own ship like an Olympic athlete.
“I know which button does the forcefield!” Becka yelled as we piled into the ship, and the blonde ran into the control room to press something down on the panel.
The protective shield buzzed to life, and the ship suddenly felt a lot bigger with only three of us inside.
I sat down in the pilot’s seat and looked at the sea of buttons in front of me. I tried to remember everything Adhara had taught me, and I took a deep breath.
“Okay,” I said as I looked at the three speed dials. “We need to use the mid-speed dial and then hit this red button to fly.”
“You’re sure?” Becka asked, and I nodded.
Kat grabbed the radio receiver and held down the button on the side.
“Hello?” she said. “Leo, can you hear us?”
“Yes,” the male alien’s voice replied. “Do you know how to get into air?”
“I think so,” Kat replied. “Uh, Jason? You remember, right?”
I turned the middle dial and then glanced at the girls.
“You might want to hold onto something,” I said. “Here we go, I guess.”
I gripped onto the steering bar and then hit the red button to get the engine going. The ship buzzed to life in an instant, and we were suddenly catapulted into the sky with a sickening jolt. I grabbed Becka’s wrist, and Kat managed to cling onto the back of the pilot’s chair as we soared upward, but for the most part, I’d say we were off to an okay start.
“Graceful,” the soldier said as she steadied herself.
“Sorry,” I snorted. “I guess there’s a knack for doing that smoothly. You guys okay?”
“Never mind us,” Becka said. “Look.”
I followed the blonde’s finger and saw that she was pointing down at the giant herd. They were close enough to see without the help of the night vision goggles, and even up in the air, I could hear their thunderous feet and bone-chilling calls.
It had to be the most intimidating herd we’d ever encountered.
I could see the ridged backs of the spinosauruses as they plodded along beside the t-rexes and mapusauruses. The dull green of the t-rexes almost blended into the grassy landscape, and the huge ridge on the spinosauruses’ backs looked intimidating as hell.
Maybe it was because we had encountered those two fuckers before, but somehow the mapusaurus still seemed the creepiest of all. Their shadow-like scales would be so well-disguised in the dark if it weren’t for the goggles, and the only thing to give them away were those glowing red eyes.
They were heading in a beeline for building 33.
As we hovered in the air, static came through on the radio.
“Jason,” Leo said. “What is plan?”
“Okay,” I said. “We need to get in front of the herd and stop them from reaching the gray building. Use everything you’ve got, just mow down as many of them as possible. We might not be able to get them all, but they are packed so tightly together the blaster laser beams should be able to do a bunch of damage.”
“Yes,” Leo replied, and the male alien’s spaceship suddenly swooped down and headed for the herd.
“Go, then,” Kat urged. “Use the steering wheel. I mean, steering square?”
I gripped the rectangular shape and then carefully aimed forward toward the herd. The spaceship moved surprisingly smoothly, and we started to dive down behind Leo’s craft.
“You’re doing it!” Becka cried. “You know how to use the cannons, right?”
“Yeah.” I nodded, and I carefully maneuvered us so we were facing the herd head-on.
As the dinosaurs came closer, I could see the glistening in their eyes. There must have been at least fifteen of them, but their size made it seem like so much more.
“Kat,” I said. “You drive, and I’ll use the plasma weapons.”
“What will I do?” Becka asked, and I threw her my night vision goggles.
“Use these,” I said. “Keep an eye on the building and make sure we don’t miss any fuckers sneaking by.”
I stood up to let Kat take over the pilot seat, and I stationed myself beside the cannon control stick.
Becka slid the goggles on and leaned over the control panel to get a good view.
“Okay,” I said as I lined up my first shot. “I don’t exactly know how far these things can travel, but I think we should get a little closer.”
“On it,” Kat said, and she moved the steering bar forward gently.
The ship slowly edged further toward the herd, and I aimed the green beam of light at the closest spinosaurus. Leo’s ship was right next to us, and I grabbed the radio receiver as I kept my aim on the dino.
“Ready, Leo?” I asked.
“Ready,” the alien replied, and I saw a second beam of light appear on a t-rex’s face.
I pulled the aiming stick out of the control panel as I kept the green light on the spinosaurus, and then I quickly let go of the device.
The orange laser of alien gases launched out of the ship, and it sailed straight at the spinosaurus. There was a brief roar, and then the laser cut into the dino’s skull. Its massive body lit up with a hazy glow for a millisecond before it disintegrated into a million fiery pieces.
Leo’s weapon fired a second after mine, and the t-rex in front of him turned into dino confetti.
The explosions broke up the herd as several of the surrounding dinos got caught in the blast, and suddenly, their slow footsteps became a stampede of chaos as the huge beasts raced off in different directions.
“Shit!” Becka said. “They’re going everywhere. Quick, there’s one going for building 33.”
Kat swerved the ship around to face the gray building, and I clutched onto the control panel to stop myself from falling over from her sudden movement.
“Sorry,” the soldier said as Becka gripped the back of the chair. “This thing is so powerful, the tiniest touch makes it go mad.”
I looked down at the t-rex that had started to head in the direction of the research facility, and I quickly lined up my shot to the back of its head before it could get too close for my plasma cannon to be used. Then I released the next stream of pinpointed plasma just as one of the girls on the ground fired their blaster.
The orange plasma from the ship hit the t-rex at the same time as the purple sphere from the blaster did, and it created a fireworks display of dino insides.
The two colors combined as the t-rex lit up, and the explosion shot so high up that the splatter almost hit the ships.
“Nice.” I smirked. “Okay, Becka, how’s the dome looking?”
“They don’t seem to care about it really,” the blonde replied as she leaned over the control panel. “I can’t see anything trying to get in there. Oh, shit, there’s one sneaking around the other side of building 33!”
Kat swerved the ship slightly more gently than before and drove us speedily over the gray roof. I looked down to see a mapusaurus slowly moving around the walls, and it sniffed the ground as it went.
“I think it can smell the guys inside,” I said. “Or us, or maybe it’s the Hadron Collider.”
“Either way,” Kat said. “Blow that fucker up.”
I aimed the green beam down onto the dino’s back, but I was confused to see the creature suddenly pull in closer to the wall.
“What the fuck?” Becka asked. “What’s it doing?”
“It knows,” I said as my body suddenly felt cold. “It knows we won’t risk blowing up the building. It’s trying to get as close to th
e walls as it can.”
“No,” Kat said slowly. “It surely can’t--”
The soldier was cut off as the mapusaurus slammed itself against the wall, and bricks tumbled to the ground into a pile of debris.
“We need to get closer,” I gasped. “If you take the forcefield off, I can make the shot with my sharp gun.”
“Should we really have the forcefield off?” Kat asked. “That seems super risky.”
“I’ll make it fast.” I nodded. “We need to get this bastard before he causes any more damage.”
The soldier didn’t argue, and she swerved the ship around to fly right toward the mapusaurus. Then Kat maneuvered the craft so the ship entrance was just a few feet away from the dino’s head, and I bolted for the exit.
“You better be fast!” Becka screamed after me. “If the forcefield is off, we’ll be seriously exposed!”
“Do it, I’ll handle this!” I called back.
I heard the forcefield buzz off just as I skidded to a halt beside the doorway, and I could see the red glow of the dino’s eyes. We were just a few feet above it, and I needed to act quickly, but I knew I could blow this fucker to pieces if I pumped it full of sharp bullets.
And this time, I wasn’t on foot and exposed in a nesting ground. I had the full advantage from the air.
The mapusaurus looked up, and it let out a bone-rattling roar. Its breath stank of decay, and I wrinkled my nose as I took a shot at the dino’s open mouth. The bullet shot right into the back of the beast’s throat, and there was a deep, squelching noise as I quickly shot a second bullet between the eyes for good measure.
Both bullets tore right through the skull, and my next four shots splattered more and more tissue around the area until the dino’s head exploded with a watery pop.
The dinosaur’s headless body swayed, and then it tumbled down onto the damaged wall.
“Fuck yeah,” I muttered, and I turned on my heels to race back into the control room just as Becka turned the protective shield back on. “Handled it.”
“Good,” Kat snickered and brought us higher up again.
“We may have a problem, though,” Becka said. “The other dinosaurs are getting curious about what’s going on.”
“Shit,” Kat hissed, and we heard more and more roars call out over the landscape.
Shapes seemed to be moving on every side, and it looked like the whole neighborhood of dinos were deciding to come and check out the noise.
“Okay, “I said grimly. “It’s time to mow these fuckers down.”
“What’s the plan?” Kat asked.
“Shoot every single one we can,” I replied as I stared down at the massive army of dinos. “Let’s eliminate as many of these bastards as we can before we go save the world.”
“Let’s do this,” Kat said, and she flew directly toward the oncoming herd.
I took aim at the middle of the group, right at one of the t-rexes that was barreling toward us. I hoped the blast would knock out more than one since they were all close together, and I was ready to blow up as many dinosaurs as possible.
I pulled back the lever and released the orange plasma laser right into the center of the herd. The beam lanced into the belly of the t-rex, and several dinos around it glowed briefly before a fountain of blood erupted everywhere.
Then the herd suddenly broke apart, and it looked like panic had set in amongst the remaining dinosaurs.
There were screeches and roars from below as the dinosaurs spread out, and I wasted no time scanning for my next target. My eyes instantly caught on another massive spinosaurus that was headed right for the dome with three others in tow, and the leader was just as huge as the spinosaurus that tore through Becka’s leg during our trip to Ravenscar.
A slightly evil grin spread across my face as I lined up my next shot.
“I don’t think so,” I hissed as my green beam of light locked on the largest spinosaurus’ back, and I released the alien weapon just as the beast looked up at the ship.
The orange beam of plasma hit the dino’s rump dead on, and the whole body became a volcano of insides. A shard of its massive back plate launched up into the air with bits of dangling skin still attached, but the rest of the beast, along with the three spinosauruses surrounding it, turned into smears of flesh and bones on the grass.
“Nice one, Jason,” Becka giggled.
“That one was for you,” I chuckled.
“There’s a big group over to the right, Kat,” the blonde Brit announced.
The soldier spun the ship around and pointed us toward a cluster of allosauruses and raptors. They seemed to be hovering away from the others as if they thought they could go unnoticed.
I aimed the light beam right at the biggest allosaurus and quickly launched the plasma cannon at the group.
One of the raptors tried to run as the orange ball of gas flew through the air, but no dino could outrun the alien weapon. The explosive hit the cluster of dinos, and they blew up into pieces with a warm glow.
Blood splattered over the green landscape and all across a nearby clump of bushes, and Becka whooped beside me as she jumped up and down at the gory sight.
“This is a bloodbath,” Kat snickered. “It is so satisfying to watch them all go bang.”
“It really is,” I agreed. “It looks like Leo is making good use of his cannons, too. These things are fucking incredible.”
“They look so fun,” Kat said as she looked up from the chair.
“You want a go at the cannons?” I grinned, and the soldier nodded.
“Go ahead,” I laughed, and the pretty soldier leapt to her feet as I slid down into the pilot’s chair.
“So to aim--” I began, but Kat waved a hand.
“I watched you,” she said. “I’ve got it.”
“Okay,” I laughed. “Let me find you some dinos to blow up.”
“Hell yeah,” Kat cheered, and I dove the ship down toward a mapusaurus.
I didn’t know if it was because of the near-death experience I had at the storage place, but those bastards were my most hated dino of the moment. Even more than the spinosauruses. Their glowing red eyes gave them an intelligence that I didn’t fucking like, and the fact that they had shown up just as we were about to make a breakthrough made my blood boil.
Kat wasted no time before aiming the green spotlight onto the black dinosaur’s snout, and as the creature opened its jaw, she released the weapon.
The orange ball hurtled into the dino’s enormous, open mouth, and its body glowed orange from within right before its flesh erupted in every direction. The red eyes blew up with the rest of the skull, and I smirked as the creature was turned into a hailstorm of gore.
“The ommati are running,” Leo said over the radio. “We have killed most.”
I looked down to see some of the dinosaurs taking off into the dark and grassy distance, and I figured they were the smart ones that had clocked onto the fact they were not going to win this battle.
The landscape was painted red with blood everywhere I looked, and I couldn’t help chuckling as I looked down at where the massive herd had once been.
“Looks like we did some serious damage,” I said as I grabbed the radio receiver. “Let’s get back on the ground.”
“Yes, we are done here,” Leo replied simply, and his ship soared back to land next to the gray building.
“Do you see Hae-won and Adhara?” I asked as I slowly maneuvered the ship close to Leo’s.
“Not yet,” Becka said as she scanned the ground below. “But they’ll be there, don’t worry.”
“How the fuck do you land this thing?” I asked, and I experimented by aiming the steering column downward.
The ship jolted forward, but it didn’t lower itself evenly like I needed it to.
“Leo,” Kat said as she grabbed the radio receiver. “How do we land?”
“Land button,” the alien said simply, and I could practically hear Becka roll her eyes.
“Which
is where?” the soldier prompted.
“Under fly button,” Leo said. “Very simple.”
There was a dark green button underneath the row of red ones, and I made sure we weren’t too close to Leo’s ship before I pressed it.
I braced myself for a rocky ride, but the craft smoothly lowered itself down onto the ground with nothing more than a gentle sway. My throat was dry as I looked out into the dark doorway of the building, and I couldn’t see Hae-won or Adhara from the craft.
“Let’s go,” I said as I got to my feet, and my heartbeat was in my ears as we hurried out of the control room.
As I jumped out of the forcefield, I could hear the welcome sound of dino footsteps getting fainter and fainter as they raced away from the graveyard of their herd members, but I barely registered the sound. I was busy sprinting over the shattered glass and up the entrance stairs of building 33, and Adhara’s voice greeted me seconds later.
“Jason!” my alien lover called and raced out of the dim hallway with Hae-won at her side.
I let out a half-laugh, half-sigh as I grabbed both girls into my arms and pulled them close.
“We saw you guys shooting the cannons!” Hae-won squealed. “That was awesome, you got so many of them!”
“The ommati are wiped out.” Adhara smirked. “I knew you would do good with cannons.”
“It was the result of some pretty awesome teamwork,” Kat laughed, and I sent the pretty soldier a wink.
Then Leo appeared beside us and glanced down the hallway.
“Underground now, yes?” he asked like it was any other casual day, and I nodded.
“Mateo went this way,” I said as we started to head down the right side of the building. “Let’s go and see how they’re getting on.”
We jogged along with our sharp guns at the ready and followed the arrows that pointed to the tour entrance for the Hadron Collider. The signage directed us to a ramp leading down into a dark tunnel, and we came to a halt as we looked down into the blackness.
“Do you have that light?” I asked Leo, and he nodded as he pulled the small orb from his pocket.
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