by Greig Beck
Things, up here, she was going to say, but the words wouldn’t come.
The chopper hung in the sky like a giant dragonfly, and she snatched up the binoculars and put them to her eyes. Her forehead creased, deeply.
The plateau top had a few scrubby trees, grasses, and was pocked with caves and fissures. There was a large body of water at its center, but it looked more like a shallow pond than the inland sea she remembered.
Where was the massive jungle? Where were the tree trunks that towered into a cloud-filled sky, and the tangled vines, fleshy fern fronds, and the goddamn primordial jungle? And where were the boiling clouds and thick fog that intertwined over and through everything? She looked up; the sky was blue and clear.
Emma felt a coil begin to tighten in her stomach and she could feel the weight of Cynthia’s stare. She grasped the small bead-like mic at her mouth to speak to the local pilot.
“This plateau…it was covered in clouds, and…” She looked at her wristwatch; it still worked. “…and the entire area was magnetic or something.”
He looked confused for a moment and began to shake his head, when he seemed to suddenly recollect something. He put his hand to the mic.
“I think, yes, but is only sometime.” He shrugged. “Very rare.”
“What; rare? What does that mean?” Emma turned to Cynthia who looked perplexed and extremely anxious.
“Where is he?” Cynthia looked back at the empty plateau top. “There’s nothing.”
Emma grimaced and turned back to the pilot. “What does that mean?”
The pilot looked to his copilot and they spoke rapidly in Spanish for a few seconds before they came to an agreement.
“Every ten years.” He bobbed his head. “About, I think.”
Emma felt lightheaded and a little nauseous. “I don’t understand, I don’t understand.”
The pilot went on. “Very strange and unique to this area. Big electrical storm, I think, just here, make electronics not work. Very rare, but we need to avoid when happening. Visibility very bad, dangerous, everyone stays away for a few days, a week.” He bobbed his head. “Then all goes away.”
Emma stared with glassy eyes. Her mind felt like it was short-circuiting and refused to process the information. The pilot half turned again.
“Been happening forever. Pemon call it karutu salu – time of lizard.”
His copilot shook his head and the pair argued for a moment. The pilot shrugged.
“Andreas says lizard is not right – more like time of snake.”
“And then it goes away…for ten years.” Emma frowned. “No, no, no, not true.” Every ten years – every ten years – every ten years.
But she knew it was true. It was just like it said in the notebook. She put her hands to each side of her head. “Not true.” She barely heard Cynthia yelling her name.
Ben, she thought. My poor Ben, trapped there for ten years. My Ben.
She slumped, feeling giddy, but then her jaws clenched tight. I’ll be back, I promise, Ben, she thought, in ten years.
Emma fell to the floor of the helicopter and everything went dark.
EPILOGUE
Benjamin Cartwright ran like never before in his life. Damp green fronds slapped at him and elastic vines tried to lasso every part of his body. But he barged, burrowed, and sprinted as if the devil was after him.
Because it was.
The thing that followed him was like a river of muscled flesh that pushed trees from its path, and its carnivore’s breath was like a steam train huffing and hissing as it bore down on him. He whimpered, pivoting at a boulder and changing direction. The hissing-roar came then, making leathery-winged avian creatures take flight from the canopy overhead, and making him shiver in his ragged, sweat-soaked clothing.
Cartwright accelerated, and immediately there was a breeze on his face as the jungle opened out. He skidded to a stop at the cliff edge. His shoulders slumped.
Where he had expected to see the plateau edge falling away to a thick jungle canopy over a thousand feet below, there was now an unrecognizable vista stretching to the horizon – it was a jungle valley, primordial, and large long-necked beasts ambled amongst the towering trunks. In the air, leathery-winged Pteranodons glided on warm thermals.
The haze, the clouds, the hurricane-like winds, the oily distortion that had been in the air were all gone.
Emma was gone, everything was gone – no, that wasn’t right; it just hadn’t happened yet.
His eyes began to water as a creeping realization sunk in. Where they’d been wasn’t a hidden plateau at all, but instead they had all stepped through a hidden doorway, reaching back millions of years. They’d stepped through, and unfortunately for him, the door had closed before he could escape.
He remembered Benjamin’s warning about being trapped here forever; now he knew what he was referring to. But he knew too late.
Primordia came only once every ten years. He stepped closer to the cliff edge, and the updraft flapped at the rags of his clothing. In his hand, he held a single knife…all he had left.
Behind him, the trees began to be pushed aside as his pursuer finally caught up to him. He grimaced and turned. The foliage burst open and the hissing-roar made him cringe back a step. The monstrous snake rose up, towering over him, all coiled muscle, glistening scales, and teeth as long as his forearm.
He would survive; he was trained to do it. In ten years, he’d damn well still be here.
The snake began its attack, flowing towards him like a reptilian train – time was up – Ben turned back to the cliff edge and jumped.
END
Read on for a free sample of A Man Out Of Time: A Dinosaur Thriller
AUTHORS NOTES & THE CUTTING ROOM FLOOR
Many readers ask me about the background of my novels – is the science real or fiction? Where do I get the situations, equipment, characters or their expertise from, and just how much of any element has a basis in fact?
In the case of the hidden plateau in the Amazon jungle, the novel, The Lost World, was my blueprint. However, myths and legends surrounding some of the creatures found there, and perhaps still living, persist to this day.
The Lost World by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle
The Lost World was a novel created by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle and released in 1912. It was about an expedition to a tabletop mountain plateau in the Amazon basin of South America where prehistoric animals still survived.
Doyle was already famous for his Sherlock Holmes novels, and this book, written just for fun, went on to become enormously popular. It’s almost impossible to count the number of times it has been published, reprinted, and re-released, and there have been numerous radio and movie adaptations.
The setting for The Lost World is believed to have been inspired by reports of Doyle’s good friend Percy Harrison Fawcett's 1906 expedition to a remote jungle plateau in Bolivia. Doyle was said to have been intrigued by the tale of the remote plateau with dangerous, impenetrable forests where Fawcett was said to have seen “monstrous tracks of unknown origin.”
However, there may have been another inspiration: a 1996 Science Fiction Studies review of an annotated edition of the novel suggested that the author was also greatly interested in the Pacaraima Mountains plateaus; Mount Roraima in particular.
Mount Roraima is the highest of the Pakaraima chain of tepui plateaus in South America and was first described by the great English explorer Sir Walter Raleigh in 1595. Its enormous flat-topped summit is bordered on all sides by cliffs rising over 1,000 feet and was wrapped in many local myths and legends and said to be home to strange creatures, gods, and monsters.
Titanoboa and the Yacumama
There were tales of monster snakes existing in the Amazon jungles for centuries, and they would have forever remained myths if not for a chance discovery in a coal mine in Colombia in 2008. It turned out that a monster snake lived at the time of the dinosaurs and in fact outlived them by nearly 10 million years.
Fossils of an enormous snake were discovered and paleontologists estimated its length to be well over 50 feet. They had no idea whether the specimen found might even have been representative of the largest of its kind, so they could have grown to twice that.
The snake, called Titanoboa, wasn’t just long but solid muscle that was as thick around as a draft horse and would have weighed in at over 3,000 pounds!
The monster snake lived during the Paleocene epoch, and also a 10-million-year period immediately following the Cretaceous-Paleogene extinction event. The Titanoboa would have fed on the last of the dinosaurs and to this day, many scientists agree there is no reason for it to have become extinct.
They also agree that over-sized snakes could still exist in the Amazon basin. And that brings us neatly to the legend of the Yacumama, the Mother of the River.
In the mythology of the indigenous people of South America, the Yacumama is a monster, fifty paces long, and believed to live in various areas of the Amazon River, estuaries, and lagoons. According to the legend, the Indians would need to blow into a conch horn before entering the water, as this would bring it to the surface, forcing the Yacumama to reveal itself.
Experts believe that if the creature exists, it is more than likely to be a species of giant anaconda.
During the year 1906, the explorer Percy H. Fawcett (mentioned above), a friend and inspiration to Arthur Conan Doyle, claimed to have found a giant anaconda while traveling through the Amazon River. He shot the creature and when he measured its body stated it to be nearly 60 feet in length. He went on to say that they found trails in the swamp mud that were six feet across that supported stories by local Indians and rubber pickers that the anaconda sometimes reached an incredible size, completely eclipsing the one he had shot.
To this day, monster hunters still mount expeditions to the Amazon in search of the Mother of the River. Only time will tell if they are successful and determine whether the creature is still there.
Tepuis and the Canaima National Park
A tepui is a tabletop mountain or mesa found in the Guayanan Highlands of South America, especially in Venezuela and western Guyana. In the native tongue of the Pemon, the indigenous people of the area, the word tepui means “house of the gods” and can also be an area that is taboo.
Canaima National Park is a 12,000 square mile park in southeastern Venezuela that is home to indigenous Pemon Indians that have an intimate relationship with the tepuis, and believe they are the home of the gods, demons, and “Mawari” spirits.
The park is home to lush jungles, exotic animals, and plateaus of rock called tepuis, which have vertical walls and almost flat tops and occupy about 65% of the park. These geological islands create a unique biological environment as species can become trapped at their summit for millions of years, or perhaps even longer, as they are very ancient sandstone that have a granite base that is up to 3 billion years old.
Their sheer cliffs and waterfalls (including Angel Falls, which is the highest waterfall in the world, at 3,287 feet), create spectacular landscapes. The most famous tepui in the park is also the tallest called Mount Roraima.
These ancient geological structures date back to a time when South America and Africa were part of the Pangaea super-continent.
The Strange Effects of a Comet
A comet is a solar system body that, when passing close to the sun, warms and begins to release gases producing a visible atmosphere or coma, and sometimes also a tail. They have a wide range of orbital periods, ranging from just a few years to potentially several millions of years. The appearance of a comet is called an apparition.
A significant comet impact on the Earth’s surface would be devastating depending on its mass and composition. But, even if they don’t make landfall, the full astral effects of a comet simply passing close to our planet is not yet known or fully understood.However, we have been able to observe other events within our solar system to make educated guesses.
On October 2014, Comet C/2013 A1, designate name: Siding Spring, plunged the magnetic field around Mars into chaos, said Jared Espley, NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Maryland. “We think the encounter blew away part of Mars’ upper atmosphere, much like a strong solar storm would.”
Comet Siding Spring, like most comets, is surrounded by a strong magnetic field. When it passed close to Mars, the comet’s coma washed over the planet, with the dense inner coma potentially reaching the surface. For a period of time, Mars was flooded with an invisible tide of charged particles from the coma, and the powerful magnetic field around the comet temporarily merged with, overwhelmed, and distorted, the planet’s own magnetic field.
Those Damn Bugs!
While doing research for my latest novel, I came across a few species of creepy crawlies that were truly horrific – so naturally, I had to use them! Both lived about a 100 million years ago, and I think you’ll agree we can all breath a sigh of relief that both aren’t around today!
The Hell Ant
A reader sent me information on something fantastic that lived during the Cretaceous period – the HELL ANT (no, seriously!).The newly discovered species of prehistoric Formicidae, or Hell Ant, as dubbed by its discoverer, had a physiology that lived up to its Underworldish name. They were huge and armor-plated with gruesome mouthparts and metal-infused spikes on their head used to impale their victims and then drink the running blood.
No other living ant species had such exoskeleton cranial anatomy. The larger of the species had a horn-like appendage that jutted out over their tusk-like mandibles. As well as being like an iron-armored rhino, these ants may also been vampires – when their mandibles moved upwards, they formed a perfect “gutter” that might have funneled hemolymph, insect blood, down to the mouthparts.
The Killer Cockroach
The specimen was beautifully preserved in amber – a prehistoric cockroach that lived 100 million years ago during the age of the dinosaurs. But the Manipulator Modificaputis was like no other cockroach, past or present.
Based on its physical appearance, scientists suggest it was a nocturnal hunter in the ancient coniferous forests. Unlike most cockroach varieties today who are scavengers, this hunting specimen had long legs covered in dense hairs, long forearms capable of clasping prey, a moveable head on a long neck, and an extra set of eyes covered with an umbrella-like shield. Added to that, it had mouthparts that were like a buzz saw.
The Killer Cockroach is more anatomically closely related to the praying mantodeans, and although praying mantises are predatory, they are mostly sit-and-wait predators. But the Manipulator Modificaputis was a hunter, and certainly would have had the body and the skill to chase down and eat its prey alive.
Chapter 1
Sergeant John Crider raised his closed fist—a signal for the five-man unit of Shadow Company to halt. The bottom of his cloth facemask was thick with condensation, each breath cooled by the night air. He motioned twice to his left. Somewhere behind him, his team would be moving to their designated locations. Four days ago, recon satellites above North Korea detected an unknown power surge in an uninhabited area, east of Phungso. Within thirty-six hours, Shadow Company had boots on the ground.
John crouched and moved behind cover. He peeled back the protective covering on his watch face. Forty seconds until his team would be in position. Slowly, he raised his suppressed service rifle to his shoulder and peered through the scope. A bare yellowed bulb illuminated the front of a small brick building fifty yards away. The building was windowless, no bigger than a one-car garage, with a single rusted metal door below the light. Tire ruts cutting deep into the ground were a good indication the area was still active. The earpiece in his left ear clicked twice; a few seconds later, a single time. His team was in position. John began to lower his rifle when the metal door to the building opened. A bright white light flooded the area. Two figures, in military uniforms, stepped out into the night. One lit a cigarette while the other walked over and relieved himself on the s
ide of the building. John pushed the communicator, around his neck, twice. Through his scope, he watched the soldiers simultaneously crumple.
“Advance,” he said in a low whisper. The throat mic would carry the order to the rest of the unit.
John moved from cover and converged on the small building. Rodriguez and Zimmerman, from Unit Two, were already dragging the bodies into the nearby brush when he arrived. On the outside, the shed door looked weathered, but it hid a foot of steel behind it.
“Felts, you and Osborn stay sharp. A door this thick is hiding something,” John said.
“Roger that, Boss.” Osborn’s voice echoed over the comm. “We’ll keep your backside clean.”
Rodriguez and Zimmerman followed John into the vacant, well-lit interior. Rodriguez walked the perimeter, examining the galvanized flooring.
“You think there’s some sort of trapdoor here?” Rodriguez asked.
Zimmerman pulled the door closed. “I don’t see any seams on the floor. The guards were definitely Kores, but they didn’t seem too worried about security.”
John walked, looking for anything they may have missed. “There has to be something—”
The floor shuddered and began to descend.
“Felts,” John said into his comm. “It looks like this thing’s an elevator. We may lose audio.”
The communicator crackled. “We’ll wait forty minutes before heading back to camp. Good luck,” Felts’s voice answered.
John took a defensive position by the back wall, facing forward. Zimmerman and Rodriguez followed suit, each taking a wall. There was no telling where the elevator would dump out, and this position would give each man three firing points with no blind spots. Fluorescents, recessed along the concrete walls, lit the platform as they descended. The platform slowed before opening into a large hallway. A single soldier stood at the lift control panel.