by David Boyle
He considered the humans’ latest conversation, and no, the Van Dyke did not understand. The statement was naive, and in human terms perhaps even amusing. Yet to disclose the sacrifices he was prepared to make would serve no useful purpose. Indeed it was more probable that such knowledge would foment even greater disunity.
Thunder rumbled in the distance. Dinosaurs called out, unperturbed by the rain.
The fire, now well fed, sputtered and popped like a living entity, fierce in its determination to survive. If their efforts were successful, perhaps he and the humans would too.
Wheajo stepped beneath the tarp and, at length, settled into his trance-like state, confident that all was as it should be.
30
His shoulder was sore, and the sleeping bag clammy. And over the last ten minutes the thunder had gotten so loud it felt as if he’d be reverberated clean off the ground, the walls of the tent flashing like a discotheque. The wind was howling, the rain droning against the fly that Ron had thankfully bothered to put up and without which they’d already be soaked. The trees were taking a beating, rattling in the wind, and he wouldn’t be surprised if every last one of them was stripped naked by morning. The irksome part was that someone, probably Ron, was snoring! How he wished he could turn the world off as easily as he did.
How much time before it got light anyway? Hayden felt around for the flashlight, and flinched when he touched a leg. Look close and there were shapes to be seen, flickers playing across the tent. That wasn’t possible, was it? Hayden twisted onto an elbow, and peering through the door saw smoke and flames shooting from beneath a pile of logs, the fire sparkling like a blowtorch in the rain. It was all a blur, him without his glasses, but he could see well enough to make out the silhouette against the tarp. However much Wheajo looked like a statue on the outside, the little guy was obviously keeping track of the situation.
Good work, Wheajo, he thought, holding his wrist to the light. Even Mark would be impressed. Hayden stared at his watch as if hoping the big hand and the little one would somehow change places. Great…. The prospect of dawn in three hours carried the disquieting possibility of having to both work and eat in the rain. A bolt sizzled across the sky, the thunder rolling like wagon wheels on a cobblestone street. Better make that a probability.
Already dreading the day, Hayden scrunched himself back into his sleeping bag. A gust shook the tent before swirling across the cove and shaking the first of the towering giants by the throat. A big limb snapped somewhere off in the stormy darkness. Hayden nuzzled his arm. Three measly hours. Bummer.
Wheajo heard it too, a singular crunch among the cacophony of crashing limbs. Yet what had roused him from the grips of the putra ki had nothing to do with the wind or rain. For it was not a limb that had been broken, but a log. And not simply broken. The log had been crushed.
But where and by what?
Quickly out from beneath the tarp, Wheajo stood in the slashing rain, searching the encampment. There was little chance an animal could have passed undetected. Then too… he had to be sure. He searched behind their shelters and around to the cycads, the fire crackling under the downpour and shooting sparks across the sand. Swaying in the wind, rattling one against another, the forest beyond the cove would even in daylight have appeared as nothing more than a wall of shimmying vegetation. Yet Wheajo was not so limited as were the humans. Seen but infrequently through the screen of wind-blown vegetation, he alone was able to detect the infrared glow of three very large dinosaurs moving through the foliage.
The zipper buzzed along the door. Hayden squinted. “You too, huh? I can’t sleep either.”
“We have visitors,” Wheajo said simply, stepping in and shaking both Ron and Charlie by the leg.
“Visitors?”
Ron grumbled, “What the…?”
“You must awaken,” the alien said, staring past the fire. “And locate your weapons.”
Charlie shook his head, blinking. “What’s goin’ on?”
“Trouble by the sound of it,” Hayden said, fumbling for his shoes. “Wheajo says we got visitors.”
“What kind?” Ron asked, suddenly wide awake. “And how many?”
“Species unknown,” Wheajo answered succinctly. “Three and possibly more.”
Ron slipped his shoes on and grabbed the rifle. “Show me,” he said, and nudged Wheajo out the door.
“I meant to ask earlier, where’d you put the paddles?”
Ron vanished into the darkness. “Just get out here.”
Hayden waited for Charlie to finish cinching on the gun belt, then gritted his teeth and stepped into the rain. “Gads! It’s freezing out here!”
Wheajo stopped short of the fire, his human companions either exceptionally bold or far less visually acute than he’d realized. “Go no farther,” he said uneasily.
Ron and Charlie were already on edge, and Wheajo’s tone wasn’t helping. The world beyond the fire could well have been a bottomless pit, and Ron was straining for a glimpse of movement when lightning splintered the sky. The trees flickered, dazzlingly green, with four enormous duckbills sniffing the air immediately opposite the cove.
“Holy shit!” Charlie exclaimed, the thunderclap booming.
“I thought you said there were three!” Ron shouted above the furor, the .30-06 at his shoulder.
“I also said there was a possibility for more.”
Hayden had himself drawn together to where he resembled a stick. “I don’t see sails, McClure. Try yelling. Who knows? It worked on the lake.” He waved his good arm. “Hey you!” he shouted, stepping beside the fire. “Go on back to where you came from!”
Charlie chimed in, then Ron, everyone soon yelling, waving their arms.
*****
The herd leader sniffed the air, the nearest of his mates bobbing their heads as they strode from the forest. Then another, and another, until the group of not four, but fourteen crestless hadrosaurs came splashing along the shallows ringing the cove. The rain and thunder bothered the animals not in the least. Nor the antics of the creatures by the light.
Drawn like a swarm of enormous moths, the anatosaurs jostled for position, curious to see the sparkling up close.
*****
Ron stepped nervously, the rain slashing down. “Any other bright ideas?”
“It was worth a try.”
“There any stones around here?” Charlie asked, shading his eyes from the glare, searching.
Wheajo dragged a limb from the woodpile and tossed it on the fire. “Perhaps if they scent the smoke.” One of the animals went to all fours, sniffing.
“Good idea. Prentler, give Wheajo a hand with that. Bull, how many rounds you bring”—the animal stood upright and snorted—“other than what you’ve got loaded?”
“Like half a box maybe. You don’t want me to shoot one, do you?”
The nearest of the dinosaurs plodded from the cycads, the two teetering upright, eyes glittering, sniffing. “I’ll let you know.” The animals farther back were harder to see, but they were all shifting between two feet and four. Up and staring, then down again, heads bobbing as they pressed through the fluttering jumble of fronds. The dinosaurs weren’t being aggressive necessarily. But like yesterday, there was just so close McClure was willing to let them get.
The core of the fire sparked and sizzled, flames licking hungrily about the latest additions. With an inches thick bed of coals, the fire was fully prepared to withstand the downpour—smoke and steam vanished in the darkness—and also wasn’t getting any brighter.
Hayden stepped forward to block the rain, smoke immediately swirling in the back-draft. “What if this doesn’t catch?”
“It’s old stuff, right? It has to catch.” The dinosaurs grunted ever closer, heads bobbing, a slew of shiny eyes focused on the fire. “Okay, that’s far enough,” Ron shouted, rain splattering the scaly faces. “You, stop where you are, you hear me?” Another of the humongous animals joined the group, and like its nearby companions, rose o
nto its hind legs for a high altitude view.
“Try one over their heads, Bull. Not too close, but enough to get their attention.”
“Beware that such an action could cause them to panic.”
Hayden twisted away from the fire, waving at the smoke. “They get a whiff of this,” he said, hacking, “and they’d sure as hell change their minds.”
“Perhaps, if we could redirect the wind.”
Charlie paused, then jammed the revolver back in its holster. “That we can’t do,” he said, wrenching a stub from the fire. “But we can bring the fire to them!” He skipped forward and sent the firebrand sailing, sparks flying when his Fourth of July offering hit the lead dinosaur’s flank. The animal jerked away, wide-eyed, its high pitched honk verging on squeaky, an anguished chorus rippling through the herd.
“Yeah, that’s the ticket!” Hayden whooped.
Charlie reached to the fire, then Ron and Wheajo, flaming branches soon spiraling one after the other toward the fast-departing herd.
Between the wind and the dinosaurs honking, Hayden was hard pressed to decide which was making more noise. Still shivering, he watched as another volley went airborne and the last of the herd stampeded across the cove.
Charlie came trotting back, all smiles. “You know?” he said, searching the fire, “this is kinda fun.”
“I got that impression,” Hayden said, working warmth into his hands. “But I think you guys have done enough damage for one night. And maybe you ought to let the fire get its strength back. Cause in this rain, once this baby is out, she’s out.”
Charlie clutched his arms to his chest, nodding. “Good point.”
Wheajo and Ron strolled from the darkness, soaked and very pleased. “Got to hand it to you, Bull, that was a great idea.”
“Indeed, most excellent.”
“Guess that’s sayin’ something, huh?”
Ron got him started for the tent. “Yeah, just don’t let it go to your head.”
“Is a little damp,” Ron said, minutes later when he crawled into his sleeping bag. “Kind of refreshing, don’t you think?”
Hayden slipped a leg in. “If you don’t mind sleeping in a used Kotex.”
“Oh yuk,” Charlie said. “God damn it, it’s gonna be hard enough gettin’ back to sleep. Now I’m gonna have that runnin’ around in my head.”
Ron pulled the flap tight to his throat, his eyes well enough adjusted to see Wheajo standing by the doorway. “Hope you’re not waiting for an invitation.”
The alien stood for a moment longer before ending his stay in the rain. “We were fortunate the animals were so easily intimidated.”
Ron snickered. “Lucky, I’d say.”
“Ah yes, luck.” Wheajo nodded thoughtfully. “Since future encounters may not end so auspiciously, I suggest we relocate to a more remote location as soon as daylight is available.”
“I think we already figured that one out.” Ron jabbed the lump alongside. “How’s that go?”
“You mean, ‘It’s intuitively obvious to the most casual observer’?”
“That’s the one.” Ron closed his eyes, the rain still drumming the tent. “You know what I hate more than anything?”
Hayden and Charlie answered in stereo. “Yeah, settin’ up in the rain.”
*****
The wind had slowed and the rain was down to a drizzle. What dinosaurs hadn’t sought shelter during the storm were gradually being joined by the ones that had, groups and individuals feeding and socializing around the lake. Wheajo had recently stoked their supposedly first line of defense, and the fire was finally making progress, popping and sizzling as the rain baked from the branches, a smoky plume drifting out over the lake. He’d taken the tarp down and was busy folding when one after the other of the humans stumbled from the tent.
“You sure as hell could have picked a better day for this Wheajo,” Ron said, snapping on his rain jacket, the brooding sky suggesting the rain would never end.
Hayden caught the alien looking. “Ignore him, Wheajo. He actually loves when it’s raining.”
Charlie raked his hair back. “We got anything decent to eat?”
“There’s eggs if you’re up to paddling.”
“Don’t start with that, Prentler.”
They flopped beside the fire and sat roasting chunks of dinosaur on whittled sticks. Together with the previously roasted nuts and roots Tony had packed, the meal was adequate, if not entirely delicious. The big evergreen loomed skyward behind them, showers cascading when breezes rustled the branches. They’d drawn lots to see who would be first to work. Hayden and Charlie lost.
“You sure you’re up to this?” Ron asked, tossing a bone into the fire. “I feel a little guilty. You being fucked up and all. I’ll take your spot if you want.”
Hayden flexed his arm. “I lost fair and square. And it doesn’t feel anywhere near as bad as it looks.” The bloodied shirt tied across his shoulder was pretty raunchy. “Besides, Wheajo gave me the green light. I’ll give it a shot, and if it bothers me too much, I’ll quit. Simple.”
“Fine by me.” Ron knew there were times to be gallant, and times to just sit back and watch. “I’m not good with heights anyway.”
The sky was misting by the time they finished eating, the top of the evergreen shrouded in a low hanging overcast. Wheajo checked on Hayden, and after changing his dressing helped Ron finish tearing down the tent. They dug out the Tripper and got it and the Grumman situated nearby. Charlie had gathered the throw ropes, painters, and cutting tools and brought them to the clearing beneath the evergreen.
With the canoes packed and ready, Ron and Wheajo scoured the campsite one last time. Ron hollered along the trail. “You guys got what you need? We’re ready to take off.”
Charlie called back a few seconds later. “I think we’re good. And don’t forget about the patches.”
“We’ll be careful.”
“And don’t get lost. I’d hate to think about having to swim home.”
The alien frowned. “The possibility of becoming disoriented on a small and confined body of water—”
“He was kidding, Wheajo. Least I think he was…” Ron smiled. “Come on, let’s see what we can find.”
Hayden and Charlie stood as if at the foot of the Washington Monument, gaping into the towering evergreen at the seemingly endless number of branches needing to be cut. “Any idea how we’re gonna do this?”
“You’re the football guy.”
“Football guy?” Charlie shook his head. “I was a fullback.”
“Isn’t he the one who throws the ball?”
“No… that’s the quarterback. You weren’t into football were you?” Charlie asked, not really expecting an answer. “But I did… once.”
“Did what once?”
“Played quarterback. And then only by accident. That was the time we played Foulmouth.”
“You’re kidding. Foul mouth?”
“Something like that. Anyway, Bauchy and Thompson got trashed and ended up on the bench—”
“And you got the call.”
“Yeah, and I got the call. Didn’t do too bad, either. Lost a’course. But what the hell? We were already behind.”
“So…,” Hayden said, staring at the first stubs offering any prayer of a foothold, “can you do it?”
Charlie sighed, hefting the rescue bag with its seventy-five feet of half inch polypropylene rope. He’d never had to throw a pass straight up to someone in the third set of bleachers before. “I can try.”
Still at it, fifteen long and very damp minutes later, Charlie stepped back into their newly extended clearing. Filling the throw bag with sand would help, and with a better angle….
“This time for sure.”
“Uh huh. That’s what you said ten minutes ago.” For how strong the guy was, Hayden figured he’d be better at this. “What was the score anyway?”
“Can’t remember,” Charlie said, coiling the rope to ensure it wouldn’t sna
g.
“How convenient.”
A bag full of sand didn’t feel much like a football, and didn’t fly like one either. But this time he had the right angle, the right speed, the rope trailing the throw bag like exhaust. “Ta da!” Late in coming, the rope was nevertheless finally in position.
“I’m just glad we don’t have to do this for a living.” Charlie jiggled the rope, the bag inching its way down to Hayden. The sand was emptied and the bag discarded, the paired ropes then evened up and knotted at the end. “My turn, huh?” he said, staring skyward with a look of resignation.
“I’d say to let me cut you a couple of steps first, but with how high I can reach on my own, you might as well go ahead.” Charlie applied his considerable weight to the ropes. “Feels solid enough.” He waited while Hayden wiped the mist from his glasses, then handed off to his friend. “Be careful, okay? And if you do fall, try not to land on me.”
“I’ll remember.”
Hayden hadn’t done any serious rope climbing since high school, but whether a rope or rocks, it was the kind of activity you either knew how to do, or you didn’t. At that the paired ropes were slippery, and it didn’t take long before they were cutting into his hands. Pinning the ropes between his feet wasn’t working, and he tried shifting part of his weight to the bark. And he was making progress too, until a slab unexpectedly sheared away.
“Shit!” Charlie yelped, turning away, chunks of bark raining down. “You okay?”
Hayden had one good toehold. “Yeah,” he panted, finding another. “Just testing.” He could feel a warm trickle down his back. Oh well.
If given a choice between tree climbing or rocks, he’d take the hard stuff every time. But climbing was climbing when you got down to basics. Flaky and wet, and about as stable as aunt Clara, the bark under his toes had a lot in common with sandstone: able to support some weight so long as it wasn’t too much. A tricky balancing act, dangerous even, considering the consequences. Then again, he loved whitewater too.