by J. T. Cross
LOST VALLEY
A Serial Novel
Part Three:
The Escape
by
J.T. Cross
Books by J.T. Cross
STANDALONE NOVELS
Beneath the Deep
LOST VALLEY SERIAL NOVEL
The Discovery
The Hunted
The Escape
Lost Valley: The Escape
Published by J.T. Cross
Copyright © 2012 by J.T. Cross
All rights reserved.
E-book Edition, License Notes
This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be re-sold. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.
Dedication
To Valerie, for her patience while I worked on this book.
Acknowledgments
Special thanks to J.R. Rain for the original story concept and characters presented in the Lost Valley. Thanks to Susanna Kubernus for her creative cover design and to Eve Paludan for her eye for detail and great insight as an editor.
Lost Valley: A Serial Novel
Part Three: The Escape
Author’s Note
This book is Part 3, the conclusion of the Lost Valley serial novel. The parts should be read in chronological order. For the best reader experience, please read Parts 1 and 2 before reading Part 3.
Previously…
At the end of Part 2, Kate had lost control of her ATV and plunged down a steep mountainside. Lost and alone, far below the others, she was vulnerable to attack from the deadly creatures in the valley. Luc found Kate in an area filled with thick brush. But, suddenly, when he most needed his shotgun, he didn’t have it . . .
Chapter 1
Keeping his eyes on the approaching wolf, Luc reached down slowly with his right hand and felt for the handle of his survival knife. With his thumb, he unsnapped the thin strap that secured the blade in its leather sheath. He gradually withdrew the knife as the wolf’s deep snarling increased in volume and intensity. It took another stiff-legged step toward him, the fur along its nape standing on end, teeth glinting below its curled upper lip, and saliva dripping.
“Stay behind me, Kate!”
“Luc, where’s your shotgun?”
“I laid it on the ground outside the brush. Big mistake.”
“What are we going to do?”
“Get back as far as you can. I don’t think this wolf’s going to give up without a fight.”
Training and instinct took over as Luc reached down and grabbed the bottom of his jacket then slowly lifted his hands out to his sides as he made himself look bigger. “Go on, get away!” he yelled.
The wolf was truly an intimidating sight with its yellow eyes glowing from the bright beam of his flashlight as well as from its sheer bulk and predatory intent. Luc realized the wolf wasn’t simply being territorial; it wanted to take him down and make a meal of him.
The wolf took another step toward Luc, pulled back its lips, and exposed its fangs even more.
Trying to look bigger and more intimidating had done absolutely nothing to drive the animal away. If anything, it appeared to have even made it more aggressive, he realized. He lowered his arms and let go of the jacket. He began slowly backing away.
For each step backward he took, the wolf advanced toward him. There was no doubt in Luc’s mind that the wolf was going to attack at any moment.
He quickly decided on an approach to defend himself and gripped the handle of his large survival knife tightly with both hands. He pointed the blade in the direction of the wolf.
If and when the wolf jumped at him to attack, he decided he would try to shove the knife as deeply into its chest as possible. If he missed, or failed to hit a vital organ, he knew the wolf would clamp onto him with its powerful jaws and rip him to pieces. He wouldn’t get a second chance.
He readied himself for the inevitable. Seconds later, the wolf leapt. It launched itself through the air with its mouth open. Its long, bared teeth were exposed and aimed at his neck.
Without warning, a deafening blast went off next to his head. He jumped backward in shock, completely unprepared for the concussive blast. He watched the wolf fall writhing at his feet. It struggled for several seconds, legs running, but going nowhere, and then was still.
It took him a moment to realize what had happened. He turned around and saw Kate holding a shotgun. He had never been more relieved or more thankful.
“You saved my life,” he said.
“Well, I wasn’t going to let him eat you! Are you okay?”
“Yeah, thanks to you. Where did you get the shotgun?”
“I remembered it had fallen out of its boot. It was lying across my neck all the time you were trying to get me out from under the quad. I crawled back in and got it.”
He put his arms around her and held her tightly. They stood that way for a while as his racing heart began to slow.
From outside the thick brush, he heard another shotgun blast. He suddenly remembered Chuck. He had to get out there and help him. He was obviously in some sort of trouble.
“We’ve got to find Chuck,” Luc said and took the shotgun out of her hands. He grabbed the forestock and quickly snapped it back and then forward, ejecting the empty shell and loading a fresh one into the firing chamber.
He stepped around the body of the wolf and began making his way back out of the brush. “Stay close behind me,” he said to Kate.
“We’re coming out. Don’t shoot,” he yelled loudly as he left the brush and walked out into the level open area with Kate close behind him.
A lone light moved back and forth in the distance. Luc took off at a fast pace, heading toward the light and soon found a half circle of wolves advancing on Chuck.
“Shoot Chuck. Shoot,” Luc yelled out.
“Out of ammo!” Chuck screamed in desperation.
Luc quickly advanced on the wolves, and as he got closer to them, their attention moved off Chuck and onto him. The largest one moved away from the group and began approaching him with its head held low and its growls filling the night.
Luc abruptly ran toward it and shot a round straight into it. It howled and ran, falling to the ground a short distance away. Luc noticed the others starting to back off a little. The advantage on his side, he ran at another one and fired. It ran into the night, howling and whining, and then there was silence. He advanced on the last three then lunged at them. They turned and ran into the night, not looking back. He flashed the beam in their direction but saw no trace of the wolves.
Luc turned back around to Chuck. His face was white and his eyes wide with fear. “They almost got me,” he said then shook his head and blew out a long breath of air in a sputtering sound.
“Are you okay?” Luc asked.
“Yeah, but I should’ve put some extra shells in my pocket before we started down the mountainside.”
“We should probably get back up to the top before something else comes after us. I’ve never seen any place like this,” Luc said as he glanced once again into the darkness.
Chuck looked down at the ground and ran his hands through his short-cropped hair. “I think that’s about as close as I’ve ever come to death, and in the Navy, I had a few close calls,” he said.
“Chuck, without you, those wolves would have been all over us in the brush. There’s no way I could have handled them all.”
“Well...thanks,” Chuck said still looking down at the ground, but with a little smile on his face.
Luc clapped him on the back. “I forgot to bring extra ammo, too. We were focused completely on getting down to Kate. It’s understandable, but we can’t make that mistake again. This place is just too damn unforgiving.”<
br />
“It’s unbelievable,” Kate said as she stood next to Luc, gripping his arm. “It’s like Wolf Central Station.”
Chuck looked Kate up and down quickly. “Are you okay?”
“I’m a little sore, but other than that I think I’m okay.”
“You really had us worried,” Chuck said.
“I was worried about me, too.”
“Is your quad okay?” Chuck asked.
“Kate’s quad landed upside down on some heavy brush,” Luc said. “I don’t think it got too messed up. That reminds me, I need to get back in there and turn off the key. We can’t afford to run down the battery in the middle of nowhere.”
He jogged back over to the brush and made his way into the quad. When he came to the wolf’s body, he stepped over it but still felt nervous, despite the fact that it was dead. He had never before seen a wolf that big.
He made his way back to the ATV, laid down his shotgun, and crawled in under the machine on his back. He directed the flashlight up and through the brush until he saw the handlebars and then the key. He could see that it was still in the Run position.
He propped himself up on his elbow, and straining, reached up until he was able to grasp the key. He turned it to the Off position then worked himself out from under the machine.
He didn’t like the idea of the quad being upside down all night long. He grabbed it and tried to pull it back out of the brush, but it was too heavy and wouldn’t budge. He decided to try another tactic.
He climbed up and back onto the brush until he was next to the quad then grabbed one side. He lifted and pushed as hard as he could until he had rolled it right side up. Climbing back down, he grabbed the front utility rack and tried to tug it back out of the brush. It wasn’t working. The machine was just too heavy for him to handle alone. It looked like he was going to need some help from Chuck.
He picked up his shotgun and made his way out of the brush, stepping over the dead wolf as he went. He hurried back to Kate and Chuck. As he reached them, the sound of yapping and howling in the distance immediately caught his attention.
“I don’t like the sound of that,” he said. “We need to get back up to the quads. We’re sitting ducks, out in the open like this.”
Chapter 2
The climb back up to the quads was harder than the descent had been. Luc and Chuck made sure that Kate was safely in front of them as they struggled back up to the ledge. Luc was concerned that if she lost her balance she could easily fall backward, and once they neared the ledge, that could be quite a distance.
They quickly found that the only way to climb such a steep slope was on all fours, and even at that, they were constantly sliding backward and having to help catch one another. Eventually, they reached the ledge and Luc pushed Kate up over the edge. She crawled over to a quad and lay down next to it on her back, taking in deep lungs full of air.
Luc crawled up onto the ledge, then took Chuck’s hand and helped him up and over. He bent over for a few moments, resting his hands on his knees, catching his breath. Definitely easier going down than climbing back up, he thought.
He glanced at Kate and saw she was still lying on her back, exhausted. Once he had caught his breath he walked over to his quad.
He removed the bungee cords that secured his backpack and unzipped the top flap. He reached in and removed a box of shotgun shells, emptying it into his pocket. He then filled the magazine of his shotgun until it was full. He loaded Chuck’s, too, and gave him a handful of extra shells.
“We’re back in business,” Luc said.
Kate sat up. “Hopefully we won’t get any unwelcome guests up here,” she said as she leaned back against the quad’s rear knobby tire and hugged her knees.
That reminded Luc that they had to figure out where they were going to sleep for the night. There was more work to be done. He brushed the dust off his pants as the sound of a roar from below filled the area. Kate immediately stood and walked over to him.
“What do you think that was?” she whispered.
“I think it’s the cat that attacked you.”
Chuck crept closer to the edge of the ledge and looked down below.
The roar of the giant cat rang out again against the backdrop of a growing cacophony of growling and yapping. The cat screeched and roared again. He heard a wolf suddenly yelp and begin whining, evidence that it had gotten too close to the large cat. He could only imagine what one swipe of its powerful claws could do to a human.
The wolf’s fate had not stopped the advance of the others, judging by the sudden screeches and roars of the cat. Luc guessed that the remaining wolves had set upon it as a pack, a fate that he would have probably experienced if it hadn’t been for Kate’s kill shot.
The three of them stood close together and listened to the awful sounds that testified to the ferocity of the fight occurring below. Kate’s mouth fell open as she listened. It sent chills down Luc’s spine, realizing that when the wolves were done with the Smilodon, they would probably climb up the mountainside to pursue them.
The sound of the fight suddenly changed as the giant cat’s loud roars shrank to a soft mewling sound. It was as if its batteries had just run out. After that, the nature of the growls and yaps changed. Suddenly, it sounded as if the wolves were fighting each other.
In his experience, Luc knew these types of sounds only came during a feeding frenzy when dominant pack leaders began to eat and enforce their superiority over the weaker members.
“We need to find a place that’s better protected,” Luc said. “As soon as they’re done eating that cat, they’ll probably be up here after us.”
He wondered for a moment if they should try to make it farther back up the mountainside and put more distance between themselves and the wolves. A brief look back up the slope and he quickly decided that option was out of the question. It was just too steep. They had probably been lucky to make it down in one piece in the first place.
He decided he would try to find a more protected spot somewhere close to them. To the north was the path he had intended to take on their continued descent down the mountainside, but the Smilodon and Kate’s ATV accident had put an end to that effort for the night.
Several large boulders blocked the other end of the ledge to the south. He wondered what was on the other side of them. Any type of small protected area, from which they could defend themselves, would be better than the open ledge.
He directed his flashlight at the distant boulders and began walking toward them. When he got closer, he saw that the largest one lay directly against a vertical section of the mountainside. It formed a small cave-like opening about three feet high where the bottom of the boulder abruptly curved away from the side of the mountain.
He knelt down in front of the opening and shined the light into the darkness. The crevice extended deep between the boulder and mountainside forming a cave-like enclosure. It was exactly what he had been hoping to find and looked like it would be large enough to fit the three of them.
Although he could see clearly to the back, there were many nooks and crannies in which an animal could be hiding. He couldn’t afford to send in Chuck and Kate without first checking for an occupant.
He got down on his hands and knees and slowly crawled in. Once inside, he saw that it opened up above him. Six or seven feet back, the cave dead-ended. He spent several minutes shining the flashlight into all the small openings near the ground then got to his knees and checked everything above. It appeared to be empty.
The small crevice would be a perfect place to hole up for the night, he thought. Now, if there was only a way to seal the opening. He looked back out across the ledge and saw Kate and Chuck talking near the quads. He suddenly got an idea.
He crawled back out and went over to them.
“Find anything?” Kate asked him.
He pointed to the south. “There’s a small opening between the boulders. It looks big enough for us to spend the night in.”
�
��Are you sure there’s nothing in there?” she asked in a wary tone.
“It’s safe,” he said. “I just checked.” He picked up Chuck’s backpack and walked back toward the opening with Chuck and Kate following close behind.
“I think it would be best if you went in first, Chuck,” Luc said.
Chuck crawled in and Luc pushed his backpack in after him.
“You can use this to lie against. It’s softer than the rock walls,” he said.
He watched Chuck pull it in the rest of the way then turned to Kate.
“Your turn.”
After she crawled in, Luc went back to his quad. He put it in neutral and pushed it back over to the opening.
He took his backpack off the utility rack and passed it in to Kate, who pulled it into the middle of the crevice. He crawled into the opening then grabbed the front of the machine and pulled it in behind himself, wedging its front end as deep into the opening as he could.
He examined the space around the front end of the machine and the rock opening. It looked like it would effectively block their hiding spot from access by large animals. He reached back out, grabbing the shifter and put it into first gear. That ought to keep it where it is, he thought.
“I don’t think the wolves can get in around the quad,” Luc said. “We should try to get some rest. We’ve got a lot of challenges ahead of us tomorrow.”
Luc situated his backpack so he could lean back against it and Kate snuggled up to him, laying her head against his shoulder.
“Luc,” she said softly. His name came out like a prayer and he did not miss how she said it.
“Kate,” he whispered, with equal feeling.
“We’re going to find them tomorrow. I feel it.”
“Thanks.” He put his arm around her as she snuggled against his chest. A little while later, she slid down and laid her head on his lap and Luc heard her breathing change. He realized she had fallen asleep. Shortly after that, Chuck began to breathe heavily. The big guy was probably pretty damn tired, he guessed.