by Laura Martin
The tunnels were deserted. The alarm had done its job, and everyone had taken cover. I flew past the bathroom where Ivan had been arrested and the subway platform where Chaz had stolen the port. A few tunnel entrances flashed past me, and I wished again that we’d been able to find a map of East Compound. Ahead was a crossroads where five different tunnels intersected. The floor was thick with strips of discoloured concrete showing where old subway tracks had merged and crossed over one another. I skidded to a stop, not sure which way to go. The alarms chose that moment to turn off. It was like I’d gone deaf, and my ears rang and throbbed in the unexpected silence. Suddenly a high, screeching roar echoed down the tunnel behind me. It was immediately followed by a chorus of answering shrieks and the rasp of claws on concrete. That wasn’t the sound of one of the pentaceratops I’d let loose. For one thing, they didn’t have claws. The tiny dinosaur on my back suddenly started squirming and bucking frantically. When I glanced over my shoulder, its eyes were wide and rolling as it fought desperately to escape the confines of my leather quiver. Its terror was contagious, and its message was clear. Whatever was coming wasn’t going to be good.
Just as I was whirling to run, I heard a sound that stopped me dead in my tracks. Turning slowly, I stared back down the dim tunnel. I shook myself. My sleep-deprived and stressed brain had played a nasty trick on me. I listened again, but heard only the shrieks and grating of claws on stone. And whatever was making that sound was getting closer while I stood there. Move, you idiot, move, I commanded myself. But I didn’t. I stayed right where I was, waiting for a sound I knew I couldn’t possibly have heard.
“SKY!”
I jerked as though I’d been shot. This time, I knew I’d heard it. My feet finally started moving, and I sprinted back the way I’d come, back towards a sound I’d been convinced that I’d never hear again.
It couldn’t be him.
It had to be him.
A second later Shawn Reilly burst around the corner, Todd and Chaz running hard beside him.
“Shawn!” I screamed, fully aware now that I’d lost it. It was the only explanation for why I was seeing my dead best friend running towards me. It was then that I registered that Shawn was gesturing wildly and shouting something.
“Turn around!” he bellowed. “Run the other way!” A second later, I saw why. The hole I’d created into the compound had apparently let in more than just the pentaceratops. No more than twenty feet behind them came a pack of flashing green scales. I wasn’t sure what they were, but they could have been the T. rex’s smaller and meaner-looking cousins. Standing roughly six feet tall, with the short, toothy snout that labelled them as a predator, they ran hunched with their front legs held in tight to their chests while their powerful back legs ate up the distance between them and my friends. I skidded to a stop and turned back the way I’d come with Shawn, Chaz, and Todd at my heels.
“Take the next tunnel on the right,” Shawn yelled. We did, our feet almost sliding out from under us on the smooth concrete floor before we tore down the new tunnel. A quick glance over my shoulder revealed that two of the dinosaurs had fallen sideways trying to make the turn too quickly. The other three had stayed on their feet, their claws sliding along the floor with an earsplitting screech that made my skin crawl.
“Those are condorraptors,” Chaz called, glancing back over her shoulder. “They’re incredibly vicious.”
“I noticed.” Shawn panted, and hearing his voice sent a shock through me all over again. I reached out and touched his shoulder. It was solid. Sweaty. But solid. So this was real. He was alive. But how? I didn’t have time to think about it, though, because Shawn was giving directions again.
“There’s an old subway platform on the left,” he yelled. “Follow me.” A surge of hope shot through me. Maybe Shawn had a plan besides running until one of the condorraptors eventually caught us. Which, up until a few seconds ago, had been mine. I saw the platform he was talking about up ahead. The condorraptors were snapping their jaws only feet behind us now.
We reached the stairs leading up to the platform, and Shawn charged up them two at a time with Todd at his heels, followed by Chaz. I brought up the rear. My right foot had barely landed on the platform when a stabbing pain lanced through my calf. I screamed, falling forward. A sharp ripping tug jerked me backwards before I’d even hit the ground, and I shrieked again, scrabbling frantically for something to grab on to. There was nothing but smooth concrete under my nails, and I was yanked back another step. The pain in my leg was unbelievable, but my panic almost drowned it out completely. I didn’t need to look to know that one of the dinosaurs had clamped its jaws around the meaty part of my calf and was doing its best to get at the rest of me. The rasp of claws on the narrow stairs drowned out my next scream, and I knew I’d be dead the second it managed to get its footing and some leverage.
The sharp twang of an arrow zipped past my ear and the pressure on my calf disappeared. Shawn suddenly had me under the arms, dragging me onto the platform. Chaz was there a second later, and with their help, I was hauled to my feet. I turned to see Todd fire three more arrows into the herd of snapping and screeching dinosaurs that were attempting, unsuccessfully, to navigate their way up the narrow stairs simultaneously. One of them lay motionless halfway up the stairs, an arrow in its eye, my blood dripping off its teeth. Bile rose in my throat, but before I could pull myself together enough to be sick properly, Shawn and Chaz were yanking me across the platform towards a double set of stairs on the far end. They dragged me about halfway up, my calf throbbing with each step, before I remembered Todd.
Twisting out of Shawn’s grip, I glanced back. Todd was running in a dead sprint across the platform, his bow clutched in one hand, an empty quiver bouncing on his back, and panic in his eyes. Behind him on the platform steps were two dead condorraptors. Unfortunately, the others had managed to use the fallen bodies as leverage to claw their way up the stairs, and three of them were hot on Todd’s heels.
“He’s not going to make it,” I said, twisting out of Shawn’s grip. My leg buckled underneath me and I slid back down the stairs on my butt. The fall jarred my injured leg, but I managed to stop myself after only a few painful steps.
“What are you doing?” Shawn cried, appearing at my side a moment later. I brushed him off. Todd had gone back for me. There was no way I wouldn’t do the same for him. I pulled my quiver and bow off my back.
I thrust the baby dinosaur into Chaz’s hands. She grabbed it, looking surprised. Bracing the quiver between my trembling knees, I pulled out an arrow, notched it to the string, aimed, and fired. I’d targeted the eyes, like Todd had taught us, but my shot was a little low, and just as the condorraptor opened its mouth to lunge for Todd, my arrow slammed into the back of its throat.
It went down hard. The two dinosaurs behind it tripped, becoming momentarily tangled in the fallen dinosaur’s flailing limbs. I’d bought Todd the extra two seconds he needed to make it to the stairs. I turned and hobbled back up after Shawn and Chaz. Chaz was still holding the squirming baby dinosaur, and Shawn’s face had turned the colour of the concrete wall behind him. My arrow and quiver went back over my shoulder, and I grabbed the dinosaur from Chaz as soon as I reached her. Weirdly, it stopped struggling as soon as it was back in my arms, and I was able to easily tuck it back into my quiver as I climbed. To my surprise, the climb wasn’t nearly as painful as I’d expected. I wasn’t sure how much damage had been done to my calf – there was an awful lot of blood I was doing my best to avoid looking at – but I must not be too damaged if my leg was still functioning. Right?
We reached the top without further incident. Below us, on the platform, the remaining condorraptors had given up attempting to squeeze their bulk between the narrow railings of the steps and were wandering off. One of them stopped to rip into the dinosaur I’d killed, and my already queasy stomach rolled again.
“This way,” Shawn called, leading us at a run down one narrow hallway after another. The conc
rete floor sloped upward, and metal doors flashed past, all of them shut. I hoped that all the citizens of East Compound had managed to get to a secure location. The thought of those condorraptors charging into a school or apartment sector made me feel sick. I hoped that they were the only carnivores that had found their way in.
Shawn peered around a corner cautiously, and then took off again, motioning for us to follow. Dressed in the grey uniform of East Compound, he was making his way through this maze of tunnels and hallways like he’d been doing it his whole life. How was that possible? A minute later, he slid to a stop outside a metal door and quickly typed something into the keypad embedded in the wall. The door clicked, and we tumbled inside. Shawn threw a dead bolt before sagging against the door in relief. I looked around the small room, my hands on my knees as I fought to get air into my burning lungs. There was a small desk in the corner, as well as a cot with a rumpled blanket and pillow.
“We can’t stay here long,” Shawn said, panting. “Kennedy will send his marines to look for me as soon as they untangle themselves from those gigantic dinosaurs with the horns.”
“Pentaceratops,” Chaz corrected. “A relative of the more common triceratops.”
“Glad to see you haven’t changed,” Shawn said, smiling wryly.
I finally had enough air to function again, and I stood up, making my way across the room in two steps to pull Shawn into the biggest hug of his life.
“I thought you were dead,” I choked out, blinking away tears.
“Right back at you,” Shawn said, pulling away and wiping at his own watery eyes.
“Yeah, about that.” Todd frowned. “Why aren’t you dead?”
“Gee, thanks,” Shawn said drily.
“Seriously, though,” Todd said, “you never came up from that elevator. We thought you drowned or got eaten.”
Shawn’s smile slipped away and his face darkened. “It’s kind of complicated,” he said. “To start with, I thought you guys were the ones who were dead. I almost didn’t believe my ears when I saw the Noah’s announcement yesterday. I barely let myself hope, but after I found out that they had Ivan in custody, I knew it had to be you.”
“Do you know where they’re keeping Ivan?” I asked. “Is he alive?”
Shawn shook his head. “The last thing I heard, he was being interrogated for information.”
“First things first,” Chaz said. “You need to explain how you survived and ended up here. Something smells fishy about all this.”
“I agree.” Todd scowled, looking around. “It seems a little convenient that you not only survived, but somehow ended up here with your own comfy room.”
I glanced at Shawn as their words sank in. They were right. Something did feel off about this. In my elation at seeing him, I hadn’t let myself think about it. Now that I was, I didn’t like where my mind was going. I took a step back from my friend and winced as pain shot through my leg.
“Sit down,” Shawn instructed, guiding me backwards until I could sink down onto the bed. “I totally forgot about your leg. I think there is a first aid kit in here. Give me a second.” He hurriedly yanked the small desk across the room and propped my injured leg up on it. The adrenaline of moments before was wearing off, and I realised just how badly my leg hurt. My uniform was drenched in dark red blood up to the knee, and torn down the back. Shawn crouched down in front of me, and before I had a chance to shut my eyes, he’d gingerly peeled back the sticky fabric to reveal my leg. Todd whistled in appreciation, and Chaz leaned in to get a closer look. My stomach rolled, and I looked away quickly.
The good news was that the condorraptor had only managed to grab my calf with its front teeth. Ten ragged and torn holes, each the size of my thumbnail, marched down my leg, oozing a sluggish stream of red. A purplish-black bruise stretched from my ankle to warp around my swollen knee, making my leg look less like a leg and more like a stump of wood. Shawn poured something with a sharp smell over the puncture wounds that bubbled and sizzled. Squeezing my eyes shut, I bit down hard on my lip to keep from screaming. Whatever that stuff was, it felt like fire was racing through my veins.
“Sorry,” Shawn said. He shot a quick glance at Chaz. “Those things weren’t poisonous, right?”
She shook her head. “They aren’t. But they do have all sorts of bacteria and stuff on their teeth that could cause a major infection.”
“That’s what I thought,” Shawn said, dumping even more of the stuff onto my leg. I yelped as the pain seemed to double in seconds. Moments later the stinging eased, and I hazarded another glance at my leg. Now that the blood was washed away, it didn’t look nearly as bad as before, and I felt my queasy stomach ease slightly. As far as dinosaur wounds went, I’d got off easy.
Todd was watching Shawn clean and bandage my leg with a skeptical eye.
“Thanks for coming back for me,” I told him.
“Right back at you,” he said, turning to grin at me. “So has your plan worked the way you thought it would?”
“Not exactly.” I winced. Just then the dinosaur on my back squirmed, making its presence known.
“Chaz?” I asked. “Would you get it out for me? So it can walk around a bit?”
Chaz moved around to my back and gingerly took the tiny pentaceratops out. She glanced quickly under the protesting dinosaur’s tail before setting it on the floor.
“It’s a girl, by the way,” she said, smiling as the dinosaur wobbled unsteadily for a second, and then lumbered off on its tiny stout legs to investigate.
“I should be surprised that you got a pet out of this disaster, but somehow I’m not,” Shawn said, not looking up from my leg.
“The plan was to steal an egg,” I explained, “but things didn’t go exactly the way I thought they would.” I turned back to Todd and Chaz. “What happened to you guys? You weren’t supposed to leave without me.”
“And you weren’t supposed to send a dinosaur through the roof until we were well out of the way,” Todd pointed out. “Besides, the plan never involved being raided by armed marines.”
“Both good points,” I said. “But what happened? And how did you meet up with Shawn?”
“And Shawn still needs to explain how he survived and ended up here,” Todd pointed out with a meaningful glare at Shawn. When he didn’t get a response, he sighed and turned back to me. “About the time that dinosaur’s leg came plummeting through the ceiling, the marines apparently gave up trying to get in the door and blasted a hole in the wall. We decided that the marines looked like a better option than getting smashed by a two-ton dinosaur.”
“Actually,” Chaz began, but Todd held up an impatient hand to stop her.
“Don’t you dare correct me on that dinosaur’s weight. The point is it was heavy enough to squash us.” He shook his head in exasperation. “Anyway,” he went on. “Chaz and I made a run for the opening the marines had just created, and two of them grabbed us. They only managed to hold us for about five seconds, though, because then that dinosaur fell through the ceiling and they had bigger problems.”
“About four tons bigger,” Chaz muttered, and Todd rolled his eyes, his jaw tight. He paused, as though daring her to say something else; when she didn’t, he went on.
“Everything went nuts after that. They were trying to shoot the dinosaur, which was stupid because their bullets didn’t do anything but make it mad. When it became obvious that it was going to make it into the tunnel, they ran. Unfortunately, that guy Kennedy had us at gunpoint, ordering us to retreat right along with them.”
“So how do you come into all this?” I asked Shawn just as he was sitting back to survey his handiwork. I looked too, and saw that he’d encased my leg from ankle to knee in a neat white bandage. Dots of blood were already starting to seep through where the puncture wounds were, but on the whole it looked and felt a lot better. “Thanks,” I said, flexing my foot experimentally.
“I hacked into the marine network as soon as I got here,” Shawn explained. “So I was
following their communications. I intercepted the marines with Chaz and Todd at a tunnel crossroads. To be honest, I had no idea how to save you, but then those massive dinosaurs you let in suddenly started panicking.”
“That’s because they could smell the condorraptors,” Chaz explained.
“I never meant to let those in,” I protested.
“Well, when you open up a gigantic hole into the compound, you don’t exactly get to choose what decides to pay a visit,” Todd pointed out.
“Never really thought of that,” I admitted sheepishly. I glanced back at Shawn. “Go on,” I prompted. “What happened next?”
Shawn nodded. “Well, those, what did you call them? Condorraptors? Came flying around the corner and took down one of the huge dinosaurs.” He caught Chaz’s look and sighed. “Sorry, sorry. They brought down a pentaceratops. In the confusion, I was able to get Todd and Chaz’s attention, and we took off down the tunnel.”
“It’s what triggered the condorraptors to come after us,” Chaz explained. “They have a very strong chase instinct when it comes to hunting.”
“That’s when I saw you at the far end of the tunnel.” Shawn shrugged. “You know the rest.”
“OK.” I nodded; that all made sense. “But how did you end up here? In East Compound?” Shawn’s brow furrowed and his mouth went tight as he glanced down. I’d only seen that look on his face one time before, and it was back at North Compound.
It had been less than a month ago, but it felt like a lifetime. Shawn had just shown me the note he found hidden in my dad’s compass, the note that told me I had to deliver an information plug to the middle of Lake Michigan. He’d got that exact same look of guilt when I found out that he’d failed to tell me that North Compound was in the process of putting locks on all the entrances, locks that would have guaranteed that I never left on my dad’s mission. Whatever he was hiding now was bad. Really bad.