It dodged. The monster simply leaned to the side, letting the rocket pass. But its body had blocked the view of the towering figure behind him. Rocket connected with forehead and exploded, taking the attacker’s head with it. The body toppled like a fallen tree and crashed to the forest floor, landing atop several already dead soldiers.
Zhou felt a certain pride in slaying one of the attackers. It seemed an impossible task, but he knew their weakness now. If only his men had remained fighting, they might yet have won the battle. But alone and now unarmed, Zhou knew his life was forfeit.
After glancing angrily at his dead companion, the closest attacker reached out and took hold of Zhou. The general felt his arms snap under the pressure of the giant’s grip. Arching in pain, he tried to scream, but the air had been compressed out of his lungs. A moment later he felt a quick, hard slap on the back. The pressure was gone, replaced by a breeze that whipped through his hair.
Zhou opened his eyes and found himself enjoying a most peculiar view. He saw mountains in the distance. And a large lake. Beyond that, the ground rose up sharply. And below, the green canopy of the jungle. As he continued floating higher, he felt for a moment that he was magically flying over the jungle.
When gravity took hold again and he fell back toward the jungle, he realized what had happened. He’d been thrown, tossed into the air like a stone. He suppressed his scream and prepared for death. He’d fought well. He’d led well against insurmountable odds, and he’d killed one of the giant men.
The slap of the leaves was much harder coming down and almost knocked him unconscious. He was awake enough to hear, for a fraction of a second, his spine shatter as he struck a tree trunk.
He was dead before he hit the ground.
Chapter 45
As the crescendo of agonized bird-like calls rose in volume, Whitney recognized the strategy from her first run-in with the crylophosaurs. The scraping sound, which Whitney believed was created by the creatures rubbing their rough skin against tree bark, grew to a fevered pitch. As the chorus turned tumultuous, she sensed an attack was imminent. She knew the only reason they had yet to be assaulted was the brave Vesuvius, standing his ground before certain death.
Vesuvius stood at the front of the group, his hair raised, his teeth bared, and his ears perked. He was ready for action even if none of the others were. Of course, if the crylos were the adept predators her father claimed they were, Vesuvius didn’t stand a chance.
“Switch to explosive rounds, if you haven’t already.” Wright’s voice made her jump, but she did as he instructed.
The brush around the U-shaped enclosure shook. It was the final stage of preparation for the crylos before they attacked. They’d done the same thing back at the wall. Whitney could see how it would be useful. If not for the XM-29s in their hands, she was sure they’d all be reduced to cringing, waiting for death.
“On my mark,” Wright said, “open up with everything you’ve got.”
Nods all around signified readiness. She saw her father look at the tiny 9mm in his hand and frown. He drew his ancient sword and stood ready, like some old world swashbuckler. He was handling the situation well. Much better than she was.
For all her adult life, Whitney had easily dismissed the idea of life after death. She wasn’t necessarily atheist, but she saw no evidence to prove or disprove the validity of any religion. She had been surprised and rather shaken by her father’s evidence for the flood, especially given the recent changes the planet had undergone. If he was right, if the flood really did happen, one of the greatest, most unbelievable portions of the Bible was confirmed. And if that was true . . . what about the rest? She had always been so certain that eventually she’d find some way to shake her father’s faith, but it was he who had shaken hers. Her belief in nothing was suddenly challenged, and the fate that they now faced seemed that much more perilous.
The shaking brush grew so violent that leaves sprayed into the air. It was all the incentive Wright needed. “Let ’em have it!”
Whitney flinched as Wright, Ferrell, and Cruz opened up with their explosive rounds. One moment the charges burst loudly from the weapons, the next they exploded in the jungle, shattering trees and sending up plumes of dirt . . . and blood. Shrieks rang out and the monsters pounced forward.
Ten of them lunged into the clearing and pounded forward, claws outstretched and jaws wide open. Whitney saw the creatures for the first time; they were, in fact, her father’s crylophosaurs. Large teeth for tearing flesh. Sharp claws that seemed much more dangerous when not fossilized. And the crest on the head flaunted their power, their rule over the land. Truly, these were the kings of Antarctica.
“Fire! Damn it, fire!” Wright was shouting at her as he laid a line of explosive rounds in front of the attacking horde. The ground sprayed up in a cloud, hiding prey from predator and vice versa. Five of the creatures burst through the plume and charged forward. Whitney aimed at the one headed her direction and pulled the trigger.
Nothing happened.
The safety! She cursed herself and flipped the safety off. Her father stood by her side as she raised her weapon. He fired a steady stream from the 9mm, but the bullets had little effect. The crylo hissed at him as though to say, “You’re next,” and continued for Whitney.
Her arms shook as she fired off four rounds in quick succession. The first two missed and exploded in the ground, sending more dirt into the air. The second two struck the crylo in the chest; it reeled back from the impacts, but remained standing. Then the dinosaur ceased to exist. The exploding rounds did as they were designed to do: burst the target from the inside out. The explosion was close enough to knock Whitney and her father off their feet.
Whitney opened her eyes and looked up at the sky. She saw bright blue through the tall pine-like trees and for a fraction of a second, felt peace. Even with the barrage of explosions, the shrieks of death, the wailing attack calls, and rattle of gunfire, Whitney felt like she was floating. As the sensation dissipated, a sharp pain followed by wet, warm moisture on the back of her head told her that she’d banged her skull against something hard, and it was now bleeding.
Unconsciousness loomed. For a moment she thought she saw the Grim Reaper standing high above her, possibly floating in the sky. When her eyes refocused, she realized she was half right. Standing on the top of the rock formation were two more crylos. One was average sized, perhaps fifteen feet long. The other was a monster, pushing thirty feet from tail to snout, with a massive head. The smaller of the two leapt from the outcropping and landed twenty feet from Whitney, a distance she knew it could cover in one hop.
She rolled over and felt her mind spin. Her equilibrium was totally out of whack. She tripped over something solid and fell to her knees. Whitney saw that the object which tripped her was her father, lying unconscious. She picked up the 9mm and squeezed the trigger several times.
Nothing.
In desperation, she took hold of her father’s ancient sword and wielded it weakly, waving it at the approaching crylo. She noticed the dinosaur glance at the weapon, which only seemed to incense it more. The crylo’s throat shook as it let out a loud gobble and lunged forward. Whitney drew the sword back and prepared to swing at just the right moment. She knew a blade would do little against a predator whose jaws were full of blades, but she had to try.
A shadow leaped from above. At first she thought it was Vesuvius, performing his last act as mighty protector, but then she noticed the head, round and impeccably smooth. It was a man. In one hand, he clutched a bowie knife. With the other hand, he grabbed the crylo’s neck and swung around behind it.
With a ferocity she’d never seen in a man, she watched him plunge the knife into the crylo’s throat. Its mutant turkey call turned to a gurgle. Then the blade was withdrawn and stabbed straight down through the dinosaur's head, just behind the crest. Whitney winced as the blade audibly pierced through bone and flesh to jut out through the crylo’s lower jaw. The crylo fell limply and cras
hed to the ground.
Everything fell silent. The shrieks of injured dinosaurs faded into the forest. The large crylo was gone from its perch. Whitney struggled to sit up and saw that the group was bloodied and exhausted but that everyone had survived. Even Vesuvius, who was growling and pulling at the flesh of one of the crylos, had survived the attack. A bloody scratch over his left eye would leave a scar, but otherwise the dog had lived up to the power his name represented.
Wright, Cruz, and Ferrell raised their weapons and surrounded Whitney’s savior. The man raised his hands and dropped his weapon. She finally got a good look at him. His face was kind, though covered in blood. His clothing was definitely military, but not American.
“Who are you?” Wright asked. His voice and body language indicated that if he didn’t get a satisfactory answer, the man’s fate would be the same at the crylo’s.
“Ian Jacobson. I’m all that’s left of the European team.”
Weapons lowered immediately.
“You’re it?” Cruz asked. “Damn.”
“What happened to you?” Wright asked.
Jacobson nodded to one of the dead crylos. “They did. Caught us in the open while we were distracted. Buggers cut through my team in seconds. They’ve been dogging me since.” Jacobson looked around at the carnage. Eight crylos lay dead. “Looks like I signed up with the wrong team, eh?”
Wright knelt and inspected the knife wound on the head of the crylo Jacobson had killed. “You didn’t do so bad yourself.” Wright picked up Jacobson’s knife and handed it to him. He pulled helped Whitney to her feet and moved on to Merrill, still unconscious on the ground. “Hey, Merrill,” Wright said, giving him a few gentle smacks on the cheek. He came to with a start, shouting and flailing.
Whitney knelt at his side. “Dad, you’re okay.” She placed a gentle hand on his shoulder. His wide eyes looked into hers and relief swept across his face. Tears welled up and he squeezed her. “Thought I’d lost you,” he said. “Thought I’d lost you.”
Whitney watched as the four soldiers conferred. Wright spoke to Ferrell in a quiet voice. “Is that what killed Popova and chased you?” He pointed to the dead crylos. Ferrell shook her head. Whitney couldn’t hear her response, but she could read her lips. “They were”—Ferrell looked bewildered—“taller.”
Chapter 46
A sense of bewildered joy consumed al-Aziz’s body as he ran. The road carved by Allah slowly faded, branching out in several directions before disappearing altogether. But Allah had taken him so far, so fast. He was now ahead of schedule, even with the slow start to watch Abdul’s attempt at martyrdom.
The gear and explosives he carried seemed a lighter weight than before. His legs no longer burned from exertion. He’d been given another gift: unending endurance. He would run this race like no other . . . and he would win. Allah had made sure of that.
With a sudden repetitive beep from his wristwatch, Allah called al-Aziz to salat, to prayer. It was noon.
Al-Aziz unrolled his prayer mat and checked his compass. After the shift, it had appeared that compasses no longer worked. In truth, they worked fine; it was human interpretation that failed. Magnetic north and south still existed, but the land that had once been north was south. The reverse was also true. It depended on where in the new world one was. Those with keen minds, like al-Aziz, adapted to the change and learned to trust the seemingly false compass readings.
He found north and lay the mat down so it faced, approximately, Ka’aba, the holy house at Mecca. He knelt down and lay prostrate, arms outstretched, saying, “Allahu Akbar.” He rose to his knees again and clasped his left wrist with his right hand and held them before his chest. He began praying the traditional fatiha.
“All praises and thanks be to Allah, the lord of the Alamin. The most gracious, the most merciful. The only owner of the day of recompense. You alone I worship, and You alone we ask for help.” Al-Aziz prayed loudly and couldn’t help but interject his own thoughts into the rest of the fatiha. “Aid me in my quest, which You have so graciously bestowed upon your servant. Show me where Your will would have me go next. Reveal to me my enemies so that I might smite them with your holy vengeance.”
Al-Aziz continued, eager to finish and be on his way. “Guide me to the straight way, the way of those on whom You have bestowed your grace; not the way of those who earned your anger, the Jews; nor those who went astray, the Christians.”
In the original prayer, Jews and Christians weren’t included by name, but even moderate Muslims knew whom the prayer referred to. Long before the cataclysmic events of three months past, al-Aziz had been shown a Muslim Web site by a colleague who used the Internet for video conferencing with his brother, who was studying to be a doctor in London. It was user-friendly, bright and cheery, very appealing. The site was easy to navigate and well-designed. He followed the links on the website and came across a Flash animation of how prayer was to be performed by a good Muslim. It was educational, and everything was translated into English. Back then, ten or so years ago, it was the belief of many Muslims that conquering America could only be done through peaceful conversation. It was one of the reasons Islam was the fastest-growing religion in the world. But al-Aziz and many others knew that simple outreach wouldn’t be enough.
As he’d watched the animation progress forward he read the Arabic version, written out just as it was said. But when he read the English translation, he smiled from ear to ear. There he was, reading the traditional prayer on a Muslim website, created by the same Muslims who might denounce a terror bombing or martyrdom, and the truth was revealed. With parenthesized text added by the website administrator, the translation read: “. . . not the way of those who have earned your anger (the Jews), nor those who went astray (the Christians).” The loathing—some might say “hatred”—for Christianity and the Jews, that was really God’s divine will, had filtered into mainstream Islam. It was no wonder that so many eager Muslims joined in jihad when America lost most of its power. It was only fear of the great evil that had kept them silent. Now they were free to act!
This thought inspired the remainder of his prayer and he added, “. . . and the Americans, who have also earned your anger and who will feel your wrath through jihad, destroy them with your might, Allah.”
Al-Aziz raised his head to the sky and shouted, “A’meen!” It was traditional that if the prayer was said loudly it should be ended loudly, but the effect was unusual. Before al-Aziz could move on to reciting medium-sized suras of the Qur’an, a flock of odd-looking birds displaying blue, purple, and red plumage burst from the jungle and spread into the sky. At first, he thought he’d simply scared them with his emphatic “A’meen,” but then it occurred to him it might be a sign.
Allah was responding to his prayer.
For the first time in his life, al-Aziz got up from his mat before finishing his prayers and strode toward the portion of jungle from which the birds had fled. He didn’t draw his machete or ready his weapon. He left them next to the mat with the rest of his gear. He had nothing to fear. Allah was protecting him. Perhaps Allah meant for al-Aziz to be his next great prophet? Al-Aziz smiled as he moved through the overgrowth, spreading the green tendrils away from his face as he pushed forward. But he emerged into a ghastly scene a thousand times worse than the remains of the European team he’d discovered.
The stench from blood and bile spilled out on the forest floor in puddles like thick soup. Parchments of flesh hung from exposed muscle and bones. Fillets of red meat lay neatly upon an altar of stone. Rusty metal hooks pierced decaying flesh. The bodies hung limp, their entrails dangling to the ground. The gnawed—
He had to turn his head away.
Everything he knew to be true about the world, about Allah, about good and evil, and about himself changed in that instant. He fell to his knees, lying prostrate again, but instead of uttering a prayer he vomited violently.
Chapter 47
Three days passed without further attack or incident. T
he U.S. team, including Jacobson, made good time and began to hope that the crylos had lost interest. The creatures were probably not used to prey biting back. Merrill just hoped they didn’t have brains enough to hold a grudge, or they’d be back with a vengeance.
After climbing at a slight but constant incline for days, Merrill was happy when the ground leveled out. Soon the trees and brush began to thin. Then, as suddenly as the lake had appeared out of the jungle, they entered a field of tall plants. The five-foot stalks resembled wheat but were thicker, taller, and green.
Ferrell took to a tree, climbing to the top in seconds and shouting her report: “No way around. We have to go through.”
Wright shook his head and, for once, Merrill knew just what he was thinking. Crossing the field would leave them exposed to their enemies, human or otherwise. There would be no cover, no place to hide, no defensible position. For all intents and purposes, they’d be sitting ducks.
A cool wind stroked the stiff leaves growing from the top of every stalk, rubbing them together. The sound was like loud static. Wright shook his head again. They wouldn’t even hear an attack coming.
“This is bloody terrific,” Jacobson said. Merrill hadn’t had too much time to get to know the new addition to the team, but he seemed like a nice enough man and his accent gave him a pleasant aura, even when he was upset. The only strange part of Jacobson’s personality was his compulsion to have a perfectly smooth head. Even when they were hiking, he would take his over-used Bic and scrape it across his head, removing whatever infinitesimal amount of hair had managed to grow since he last took the razor to it.
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