Extinction Island 2

by catt dahman

  Littleton walked over to Helen and said, “They’re your children now, but I don’t know why she didn’t trust them to me.”

  “John, it must have been because I’ve been here longer and she wanted a mother-type, a female.” Helen was guessing. His words made her feel uncomfortable.

  “Or, maybe we’ll end up married, and they can be our children,” Littleton said as he looked at Helen and then walked away.

  “What the hell?” Scott asked.

  “He’s in shock, Scott. I don’t see me marrying him, not when I have you. We’re all mentally messed up right now,” Helen said, “and he’s not in his right mind anyway.” She gave Scott a kiss before going to sit with Benny and Amy.

  Scott nodded. He really didn’t see Helen with Littleton, and he hoped Littleton understood that. It was strange for another man to say such a thing to Helen. He watched Helen with Amy and Benny. Then, Vera walked by them, nose pointed upwards. Scott thought she was a strange, selfish girl.

  “Vera, do you want to join us? Amy is your age?” asked Helen as she beckoned to the girl. “Come talk to us.”

  The pet dinosaur-bird was perched on Vera’s shoulder, preening; his green and yellow feathers were beautiful and bright in the drab surroundings.

  Vera wrinkled her nose and said, “My mom won’t stop complaining, so Tom and Joy can deal with that, but I don’t think I’ll join in…”

  “Why not? You can talk to Benny and Amy,” said Helen.

  Vera sneered and said, “I doubt we have much in common.”

  “You might,” Helen said, “why not see if you do?”

  “What do you mean?” Amy asked. “We have nothing in common? So?”

  Vera looked at Amy and asked, “Were you a cheerleader? Were you voted most popular? Was your room decorated like a princess’s bedroom? Was it pink, shiny, and unbelievably expensive? Did you have all designer clothing and never had to wear the same thing twice? Did people beg to do your homework for you so you’d be nice to them? Did your father own the yacht you were on?”

  Each time a question was asked, Amy shook her head, no.

  “That’s what I meant. Nothing in common.”

  “I didn’t need all that. I was a majorette, though,” said Amy.

  “So, band geek?” replied Vera.

  “Snob,” Amy muttered.

  “Bitch,” Vera snapped back.

  “She’s pretty, though,” said Benny, defending his sister. “In fact, Vera, she’s prettier than you. Leave her alone. You’re being a jerk.”

  “Whatever, but we have zero in common, and she is not prettier. She’s ugly.”

  Helen bristled and said, “Vera, you have none of those things now. They are all gone, but both of you have lost fathers, so that’s a commonality. Why are you being mean to Amy? She just lost her mother.”

  “And? There’s nothing anyone can do. I’m going to teach Angus new tricks. That’s more interesting. Really, I have nothing to add to this group,” said Vera.

  “I agree. You really have nothing to add,” Helen said.

  Amy sniffed back tears again.

  “She’s a little meanie,” Helen caught herself. “Thank you for the pills, Benny. Both Connie and Air Marshal Lynn are in less pain and are sleeping.”

  “Glad to help. How long has Vera had that little dinosaur?” Benny asked.

  “The bird? Angus?”

  “It’s a dinosaur. Really. A young one.”

  “A few days. Why?” Helen wondered.

  “I don’t know; it reminds me of something…a type of, but I can’t think right now. My head aches from crying.”

  Helen showed Benny and Amy two pills. “One for each of you. You need some long, healing sleep. Let’s get you tucked in.”

  Neither complained that it was barely after noon, and both fell asleep in the yacht. Helen tucked them in and steeled herself to keep from slapping Vera. How anyone could be so cruel was beyond her imagination.

  Helen sat with the others who ringed the fire pit, faces tired and strained.

  Chapter 12: Specimen Bank

  As dusk fell, the compys came in large packs to feed on the poor dead sailors who had washed up on the beach. A few troodons lumbered down and ate most of the bodies, cracking the bones, staying away from the survivors. The bonfire kept them away and served to shelter everyone’s view of the carnage.

  By the morning, most of the bodies were either gone, or the bones were cleaned and scattered, and the predators left before dawn.

  As the humans sat around the fires, Helen dared to ask, “Okay, I saw the creatures and what they did. I know how they kill; I mean I get it was like acid. Can someone tell me what those slug- creatures were? Where they came from? I’ve never heard of anything like those.”

  “Did you ever read Lovecraft?” Davey asked.

  “No, should I have?”

  Davey shrugged.

  “They aren’t like that, Davey. I don’t know the name, and neither does Benny because I asked. They are some kind of slugs...blobs... invertebrates and the trees, very old…”Alex said. “I think those were among the first creatures on earth. Very old. I get the Lovecraft reference, Davey. Very cool, but wrong. They’re just weird, old animals.”

  “They’re scary,” Helen said.

  Alex agreed and said, “Maybe long ago, the storms brought the dinosaurs, maybe two by two and put them here. The storms last night brought a ship from the early twentieth century, an airplane from the twenty-first century, and slugs from the past. The storm collects. Maybe it’ll bring weird shit from the future.”

  “Meaning?” Davey asked.

  Alex sighed and said, “Meaning we are a large specimen bank. Or we are on Noah’s Ark. Or we are something else, but one day, what if a storm brings even worse things from long ago?”

  “Worse than slugs?” Scott asked. He came over and sat so that he could hold Helen tightly.

  She shivered and asked, “Worse than dinosaurs?”

  “Oh, sure. Maybe it’s mythology, or maybe it’s when people wrote about giants, old demons, and things that terrified ancient people, the things of nightmares and legends. I don’t know.”

  “You’re drunk,” Stu said.

  Alex grinned and answered, “Yup, ‘cause I am scared to death of this place. I told you that the storm collects. One day it may collect something far worse…”

  Chapter 13: Healing

  More than a full week, but closer to two weeks, the survivors experienced a variety of emotions, and the only good thing that could be said was that without television, telephones, and other distractions, they were forced to deal with reality much faster than was usual. With no escapism, they faced their personal mourning and stayed busy with physical activities. Tyrese half-joked that they were sweating away their grief.

  There was no way for Benny or Amy to escape from thinking about losing their mother, so they talked about their feelings, sharing the same sadness. They recalled funny things and difficult times about growing up, compared what they loved most about Jada and what drove them mad about her; in fact, they actually talked and listened.

  Both agreed that Jada had been enormously brave when she stepped between the slug and Amy to save her daughter, acting selflessly and lovingly. They discussed how Jada’s last moments of clarity centered on making sure a responsible, smart, and, most important, loving adult would watch over them.

  Helen.

  Jada’s consideration gave Benny and Amy some peace, knowing her love was so strong that she thought of what was best for her children right up to the end, despite her own terror and pain.

  Benny and Amy were sharp enough to understand that they weren’t quite old enough to make their own choices in wise ways and had only to look at Vera to see how young people could go so wrong. Jada was intelligent enough to know Helen would take the role seriously.

  Mattie and Harold took the deaths of Air Marshal Lynn and Mick the hardest, but actually, everyone was fond of Lynn and missed his strength a
round camp. His dependability and levelheaded choices always made everyone feel a little safer. Sadness was shared, and everyone having lost the strong, brave man, Lynn, seemed a little surreal.

  Tom and Joy left Connie only when Stu and Vaughn sat with her, so all of them helped rub soothing creams and oils into the wounds after cleaning the flesh, and then they gently wrapped her leg as Kelly directed them. Connie wasn’t healed, but she was slowly getting better. She complained often, which Tom jokingly said was a positive sign that she would be all right.

  Joe cooked little more than plain rice, beans, and fish, food he didn’t even bother to season very well. Breakfast was fruit or smoked meat, and lunch was whatever he dumped in his largest pot: meat or fish, shellfish, and random vegetables. He continued to stare out to sea with big, wet eyes. He wasn’t over Durango, and he missed Amanda fiercely.

  Three light storms brought nothing new to the beach, but luckily, didn’t come with the dreaded yellowish cast to the sky and waves. The storms did add to the group’s supply of rainwater even though the group was able to go to the closest spring for drinking water, so fresh water wasn’t a problem.

  Positive time in camp was spent improving weapons and making the yacht more comfortable, yet, everyone complained about the rainstorms.

  Helen spent more time with Amy and Benny, finding them both to be wonderful wards, whom she was now responsible for. They accepted her as easily as she did them. Scott noticed she took to being a surrogate mother easily, and his only concern was that John Littleton always found excuses to work alongside Helen.

  On the third day after the initial attack, the group gave Air Marshal Lynn a burial at sea, allowing his weighted and wrapped body to sink deep in the water. As Scott helped, he felt even more guilt, and he knew he was beginning to take each loss as a personal affront.

  Chapter 14:Big Brown Returns

  The jungle was unusually calm, which made a few of the survivors nervous, but there were no snorts or roars to alert them to a hunting pack. Other than the compys and troodons that cleaned the beach of bodies, which unfortunately continued to wash inland from the wrecked the Cyclops, no one saw any wildlife.

  They remembered Big Brown had been absent from the beach for a long time. He was large, mostly brown, but lightly covered in feathers that ended with bright blue tip plumage that helped his species attract mates. He had a mate that was big with babies, but she had attacked the camp and had been killed.

  While he didn’t retain exact memories, he did feel drawn to the beach and could still find traces of the female’s scent at times, which faded with each storm.

  Her scent was still one of anger, pain, and misery, and because he no longer saw her at the beach, he felt the same. Those were not emotions as humans might have, just scents that manifested with aggression.

  He was also careful at the beach because he did feel it was dangerous to him; his instincts warned him to stay away, despite being drawn back.

  On the fourteenth day after the slug attack, Big Brown made an appearance. His weight caused loud thuds as he ran and roared.

  Big Brown ran past the tree line and would have kept going, but paused as he recognized that other creatures were making noises and coming toward him. He wasn’t concerned about attacking a few of the smaller creatures, and he would have eaten them gladly, but he had learned to avoid a large pack of the humans, the same way he avoided packs of any predators.

  The human that Big Brown had been chasing kept running until she was past the people who were armed for a fight, knowing that she was safer with the group than she would be with the big dinosaur. She fell right at Kelly’s feet and became dizzy, as Tyrese lifted her and carried her to safety.

  Davey and Scott advanced on Big Brown with their spears and ducked his gaping maw of sharp teeth as they stabbed at him. Davey blinked away the steam of hot, salty blood that flew at him, as Big Brown dodged and swung his body around to retreat.

  “Die, damnit,” yelled Scott, as tried to hit the beast with his spear but lost his aim when he jumped to the side. Big Brown’s tail almost knocked Scott off his feet.

  Before they could try again, Big Brown lumbered off with a roar, leaving the humans alone and frustrated on the beach. While they might not have wanted or been prepared for a large fight, having Big Brown run away meant that the fight was only delayed; he was a reoccurring threat.

  The rest were armed now and were ready to fight, but then they saw the dinosaur leave. They shrugged at Scott and Davey.

  “Good aim,” Scott said.

  “Thanks. All it or I did was scratch him,” said Davey.

  “Enough that you’ll have to wash up. He’s lucky we weren’t more prepared.”

  “We were prepared enough to drive him away and save that girl. I wonder who she is?”

  Scott waited for Davey to clean himself in the ocean, watched for Big Brown, and walked back to camp to find out whom they had saved.

  Mattie and Harold were animated, talking more and gesturing as Scott and Davey joined the rest. Kelly washed the girl’s cuts and scrapes and muttered to Helen as she did. Kelly looked up and then went back to her work.

  “Who is that?” asked Helen.

  Stu frowned and said, “We don’t know everything yet. Mattie and Harold know her and say that her name is Cindy. She was on their plane and went away with the other children when that group broke away and went out to live in caves.”

  Mattie nodded, “She was with Jody, Ricky, and the rest, the last we knew. She was a pretty little girl. A sweet little thing.”

  Scott was flummoxed. It seemed to him that they were discussing two different people. The wounded girl was really a woman, skinny, mottled with bruises, and covered with bleeding cuts. She was wearing rags for clothing: a crude vest made of matted fur and foot coverings of leather that were barely shaped into short boots.

  Her dirty hair was hacked off below her ears, and might have been sandy-colored or blonde if clean. Her exposed stomach was bloated with a few months of pregnancy that made her look more starved than healthy.

  “A kid,” Scott asked, “but she isn’t a little girl, Mattie.”

  Mattie sighed and said, “She was. That steroid water they drank caused them to reach puberty quickly. She was a child, and then she looked eighteen or twenty, but she was still pretty, then.”

  “She looks like she’s in her late twenties,” said Scott.

  “She’s aged badly,” Mattie said.

  “She’s coming around. Don’t interrogate her. She’s not doing very well,” Kelly warned. “Cindy? You’re safe here.”

  “Do you remember me?” Mattie said as she knelt. She tried to smile, but it came as a grimace.

  Cindy blinked and ran her tongue over her dry lips and took a sip of water from Kelly as she watched everyone suspiciously. “Yeah, Mattie?”

  “What happened to you out there? Were you alone?” Scott asked.

  “Alone. Yeah. Then that thing come after me, and we fought in the jungle. He mushed me; I hurt.”

  Kelly told her, “You’re injured pretty badly. I have no idea how you were running because I think you have several broken bones, and you have some deep cuts.”

  “Scared. I just ran.”

  “Adrenaline,” Kelly said.

  “Were you alone?” Mattie needed answers.

  “Yeah, I said I was. I wasn’t before. He done trashed our camp.”

  “Did he kill the rest of your murdering friends?” Stu demanded. He had come up to see the young woman and hated her as he hated all of the feral children. They had killed a woman he really liked, or that he enjoyed having sex with. Same thing.

  “Hey, back off a little,” Scott ordered. He understood why Stu hated the group of kids Cindy was with, because they had almost killed Stu and did kill the woman he was with. The leader of the group was Mattie’s son. They had various views of the group, but Stu wasn’t going to get answers by saying what Mattie’s son did in a demanding way. “Were you with the other
kids?”

  “Yeah. We was down that way on the beach…long way from here, and that big brown thing come after us. He killed a bunch, and we never seen him coming. We wasn’t paying attention.”

  “Is Jody dead?” Mattie asked.

  “I hope he is,” Stu answered.

  Scott held up a hand. “Shhh. Can it, Stu.”

  Tyrese moved closer, worried that Stu might harm Cindy.

  “I don’t know. They ran. Ran! They left us there. Bastards.”

  “Yeah, they are,” Stu grinned, “all bastards.”

  “Stop it,” Scott demanded.

  “Oh,” Mattie breathed a small sigh of relief.

  “Awe, come on…” Stu was irritated, and if he were in charge, he would like to take the girl and feed her to the dino. She was from a group of cannibal kids and was useless. He hadn’t forgotten the beating he got from a few of the bastard children.

  “Stu, it’s Mattie’s son. Ease off. We need fewer emotions here and more information,” said Kelly as she begged for peace with her eyes. She was one of the few people Stu listened to. After their fight the day of the slug attack, they had made up, becoming more affectionate and even sleeping together.

  Tom never said a word about his former fiancée, Kelly, or his brother Stu, but he didn’t approve and showed it.

  “They runned off like cowards. A few of us had to run the other way,” Cindy said.

  “And where are they?” Scott asked Cindy.

  “Troos.”

  “True?” Scott asked.

  “Trudys.”

  “Troodons,” Alex joined in, “and did they attack you?”

  “Uh-huh. Juan, Carla, Dante, and Colt, and the brown one. Days and nights. He followed us. I hurt.” Cindy moaned and rubbed at the cuts and held her stomach, gasping. She was starting to show new bruises in smudged patches all over her skin.

  “She’s been on the run for days. These older cuts are from something smaller than Big Brown. I think they’re from the troodons. She has a lot of infection from cuts. She’s very, very sick,” Kelly said.