Spinosaurus: A Dinosaur Thriller

by Hugo Navikov

  Fortunately, there were a lot of militia soldiers for Mama to take her rage out on. We snuck a little closer even as she turned the clearing red with blood, guts, and body parts. That’s when one miner chose our exact location to run through to get away from the slaughter.

  I saw my opportunity. It was a terrible opportunity to take, but I took it.

  I work to protect animals and, whenever possible, people. But I was willing to do horrible things for good ends. As the soldier came crashing through our part of the brush, I stepped in front of him, and knocked him down with the egg, splashing the remainder of the amniotic fluid all over him. He sputtered in panic, but I calmed him down by saying in my rudimentary French (I could understand more than I could produce), “Take this flashlight and go this way”—I indicated the south, the direction from which we had come—”along the water and you will be safe.”

  He understood my words, already crying with gratitude and relief, and took the flashlight and cut across the fifty feet or so of undergrowth and trees to the muddy bank and took a hard right turn. I felt like the most horrible person in the world … until I remembered that he and his compatriots were going to use the monster to kill more than a hundred people so they could make money. Then I didn’t feel so bad.

  I could hardly believe it myself, but my slapdash idea worked: the spinosaurus stopped shaking her head and flinging what remained of human bodies and sniffed the air. She could smell her egg again. She unleashed another ROAR, but this one was shortened by her almost immediate run after the scent of her baby—a chase which would be aided greatly by the soldier’s recent acquisition of a nicely moving and trackable flashlight.

  “What now?”

  God, I was really hating that question, mostly because I was asking it of myself even as I heard the words come from Ellie. It wouldn’t take the dinosaur long to crunch the life out of that poor militia soldier, and then she would be without a trail to follow, except maybe if she could pick up our original scent. Either way, we needed to get through this cluster of gun-toting soldiers if we were to …

  I stopped and listened. No one was screaming. No one was even talking. I chanced a slow approach to the very edge of the base’s clearing and all I could see was death. Not one soldier stirred. The ones who had been to avoid being ravaged may have been hiding inside their Quonset hut, or perhaps had fled into the jungle themselves. And they had left something behind:

  A Jeep.

  ***

  It was spattered with blood and maybe some guts—it was hard to make out exactly what was what, and that was actually a bit of a blessing—but the Jeep had keys in it and started right up, shining its excellent high-beam headlights. Ellie looked a bit worried about “What now?” even though she didn’t actually ask the question again. She was no wilting flower, but I had seen war and she hadn’t; I had killed men and suicide-bomb–armed women and she hadn’t; I had needed to escape or die, and until now, she hadn’t. So this strong woman did what strong people everywhere did—she let someone with more experience take charge, at least for the moment. It had nothing to do with the size of her breasts and everything to do with the size of her intellect. I really liked this girl.

  If she had asked the question “What now?” old loud, however, I would have answered it very quickly by reminding her that no one needed a Jeep to get around a baseball-diamond–sized militia base. No, there had to be a path wide enough for a Jeep. The militia might have gotten this single Jeep to the island on some kind of ad hoc barge or wide raft, but they would need it here only if they were going to need some fast transportation from one part to another. (I was thinking from their base to where they could harass Vermeulen’s company and miners and back.) There was no path in the jungle from whence Ellie and I had just come, and the Jeep certainly wouldn’t have been able to drive along the mostly submerged mud of the waterline to the south, so their driving path had to be somewhere over—

  There! I saw the clearing between the jungle and the river’s edge, just wide enough for a vehicle. The militia must have cleared (or had cleared by paying the men who cleared it a dollar a day, less than the slave wages the militia protested at the mines) a path from this part of the island to somewhere on the side facing the mine.

  In the distance, a horrible roar, a terror-filled scream, and then nothing for a few seconds. Then came a shrieking animal wail of anger and despair.

  “She’s coming back,” Ellie said.

  “Let’s not be here,” I said and took off toward the shoreline path. If I were wrong and this was not a path cleared all the way around the north side for this Jeep, we would crash and maybe drown, maybe be ripped apart by Mama. But we’d definitely be dead.

  I stepped on the gas and we flew down the muddy clearance. The headlights showed only clear path ahead and I applied as much speed as I could without flinging us into the river at any sudden turn. We were making good time. Even if the spinosaur made her way back to the soldiers’ original egg-theft clearing through the island—and she would, since that’s where her remaining eggs sat in their muddy nest—maybe she wouldn’t be able to get to the river and the mine on that side before we could find the three eggs and put them right where she could find them before entering the camp and killing every goddamned living thing there.

  We were moving right along when an ERNKK sounded from our back axle and our speed noticeably lowered. Ellie and I gave each other a “What the hell?” look and she kneeled backward on her seat to see what was going on back there at the same time I tried to see what I could in my mirrors.

  “No! No, no, no!” Ellie shouted half-pleadingly, half in anger.

  “What is—” I started to ask, but then caught a glimpse of red rope dragging behind the Jeep. Or not rope. It looked more like … no.

  The powerful baby Megacobra used its upper body and jaw muscles to hurl the end of its body forward into the backseat of the open Jeep, then released the axle and swept its cowled head and neck inside as well.

  As Ellie screamed and looked around frantically for something to kill the giant snake—or hurt it, or at the very least make it fall out of the Jeep—it reared back and I knew it was ready to spit its venom. I yanked Ellie down to put her seat between her and the snake, and I ducked down as far as I could and still stay on the road.

  Seconds later a thump struck the back of my seat and the smell of melting vinyl overwhelmed us. Luckily for me, the spit wasn’t as strong as Mum’s, because I would have now had a hole eaten through my chest, where I keep many important organs. Ellie screamed again, and that was fine. My blood was throbbing so hard in my ears from sheer adrenaline that I could barely hear her or anything else, but hunkered down I saw something even more amazing than giant snakes and dinosaurs:

  There was a .45 held on by magnets under the base of the steering column. It must have been put there in case the militia was stopped and their guns confiscated, allowing the driver to surprise their attackers by putting bullets in their heads.

  I grabbed the .45, switched off the safety, and handed it to Ellie. At first she looked shocked and then she nodded, whipped herself back into visibility, and squeezed off five shots in rapid succession. The snake made a choking hiss and fell right off the back of the Jeep.

  “Nice shootin’, Annie Oakley!”

  “I took some self-defense clas—AIEEEEEEEE!” her sentence being cut off by her piercing scream, which was followed by a dunk into the backseat. It was the other baby red Megacobra.

  “Oh, come the hell ON!”

  Ellie popped back up and unloaded the rest of the bullets into this one, and it slumped dead inside the Jeep. This was good and bad and good: it was good that our latest snake friend was dead; but bad because its weight was immense and slowed the Jeep considerably; but good because the extra weight gave us better traction on the always-slippery track running alongside the river.

  Oh, and bad because here was their enraged two-story–high mother, blocking the road. “This is not how cobras hunt,” I
said, out of ideas and just about out of patience: my adrenaline had been at full capacity for an hour now and this sudden stop brought it down immediately and precipitously. My hands shook and it was hard to keep my eyes open. I didn’t know what to do or even how to say “I’m sorry” to Ellie.

  The full-grown Megacobra stood even a little taller as it collected its venom, the first glob of which would eat through the hood and the engine, or through the windshield and our bodies. It reared all the way back and—

  RAT-TAT-TAT-TAT-TAT-TAT! RRRRAT-TAT-TAT-TAT-TAT-TAT-TAT!

  Ellie had jumped forward and engaged the loaded 105mm M40 recoilless rifle bolted onto our windshield assembly. The casings flying everywhere and landing hot on my head and the seat and the dead cobra in the backseat, Ellie used up the entire belt of ammunition feeding into the machine gun. When she was done, I was no longer shaking—my adrenaline was back!—but she looked almost overcome with shock. She plopped back into her seat in time for us to watch the cryptid’s top half fall off its bottom half into the water, severed entirely by Ellie’s barrage of high-powered bullets.

  It was a sight no one ever thought they’d see, I’m sure, but I had to bring the party down by pointing out, “Nice work, but now we’ve got at least two tons of dead snake blocking the road.”

  Ellie put her face in her hands, not crying but probably on the verge.

  I heard something stirring in the water, and I shut the headlights off. Yes—there was a splash, then a growl-snarl, then another, then more splashing, and then that tell-tale exhalation of a lion’s roar: crocodiles.

  As my eyes adjusted more to the dark and we could see by the moonlight, I spotted them, two regular size (although massive) Nile crocs were rolling and ripping the flesh from the part of the cobra that had dropped into the water.

  “Of course,” I whispered. “All that blood in the water is going to attract every crocodile within—”

  Something huge—at least compared to the crocs in the water—came out of the jungle to our left and opened its jaws as far as they could go, then clamped down on the rest of the dead cobra’s carcass and dragged it back into the dark with it. Ellie and I could see it only by the moonlight, but I knew what it was because I had seen it before.

  It was the Megacrocodile, and whether it was taking revenge for its swallowed-whole mate or just hungry for a giant pile of fresh meat, it cleared the path for us, slicker than ever with the snake’s hundred gallons of blood spilled on it. But that was all right—we had our dead baby Megacobra in the backseat to keep up from sliding off the road.

  “Megacrocodiles,” Ellie murmured in awe. “They’re real.”

  “And very helpful to the island traveler,” I said with a smile as I popped the headlights back on. “I must remember to write a thank-you letter to the Congo Motor Club.”

  Ellie laughed, and that was a good sound to hear. The only thing now was to get to the mine site before our spinosaur did … if it wasn’t already too late.

  Chapter 17

  Shortly after our encounter with the Cobra Family, the path took a turn to the south, meaning we had crossed the north side of the Kasai River island and were heading toward the Vermeulen Mining camp. This was the first real measure we had of the size of the island: it was small but large enough to contain more diversity than I would have thought possible. Of course, the diversity was made up of stupendous-sized predators who I would bet anything spent most of their time on the other side of the river from the mine and from where the dinosaur had (very unfortunately) set up her nest of eggs. That was all completely unexplored by man. Maybe as humans ate up more rainforest, there would be some new surprises from those already inhabiting it.

  Or whatever. I had no time to keep pondering because some fifteen minutes of careful driving later, we reached the end of the clearing, where the riotous plant life once again spread right to the waterline. This was expected, since for some time we could see the lights across the river of Tshikapa, so we knew we were nearing the mine.

  I brought the Jeep to a stop, and there it was, the motorboat the militia used to go back and forth from the mainland. Without explanation, I rushed Ellie into the boat, hopped in myself, and pushed against the shore to move us silently away from the Jeep.

  “What’s the hurry, sailor?” Ellie said, smiling despite herself.

  “This boat being here wasn’t completely a good sign,” I said quietly.

  She lowered her voice to match mine. “What? Why, did you want to swim the rest of the way?”

  I looked behind us as we chugged from the shore. “If the boat was already here, that means those four militia guys have already planted the eggs … and they expected to see the Jeep there to take them back to their island base.”

  “Then why didn’t they kill us when they saw it wasn’t their pals?” Ellie said.

  “I think maybe they were dragging ass like tired soldiers everywhere. Look.”

  She turned to see for herself, and we were still close enough that we could see that the four militia members must have been just within the jungle, maybe taking a quick rest while they waited for their ride, when we pulled up and I ushered us into the boat, because as if on cue, they stepped out of the darkness and got in the vehicle.

  Well, two of them did—the other two jumped back at the half a giant snake carcass in the back. The two in front laughed like hell and made a motion that said Suck it up and get in, and the two perched uncomfortably on the dead snake as best they could.

  They were all in the Jeep and attempting to turn it around to go back in the direction of their camp, so I took a chance and pulled on the outboard’s chain to bring the motor to live. I don’t think the egg-thieving soldiers in the Jeep even heard it, and even if they did, we were around the bend and out of their sight within seconds.

  It wasn’t even a mile by my estimation before we had Tshikapa and the mines on our right and the crazy monster island on the left. We were so beyond shell-shocked that I, at least, couldn’t form any kind of statement about it, or even a question. Ellie seemed exactly the same. All we could focus on was, once we were near the mine shore and I cut the engine, sliding up as quietly as possible.

  It was, as usual, utterly dark except for the security lights on the Vermeulen building. We would have to tread very carefully around the dozens of deep holes the poor miners had dug with their bare hands in search of the rough stones. All seemed extremely quiet, which both reassured me and made me nervous at the same time—that meant the soldiers must have just placed the eggs, giving us at least a little time to find them and put them on the shore, maybe even in the boat for easy access for Mama. But it wasn’t good in a way, because Mama would probably not look kindly on Ellie and me—and Bonte, if we could all find one another in the darkness—carrying her eggs, even if it was to put them back where she could get them. (I don’t claim to be an expert on dinosaur psychology, but I’m thinking the greatest predator of the Cretaceous Period isn’t going to let an apparent lack of motive stand in the way or swift and terrible retribution.)

  We made it past the mines themselves and now were walking between the tents. Snoring sounded all around and feet poked out from some of them. Why hadn’t Bonte gotten them out, like he was supposed to? Anywhere would have to be safer for the miners than here.

  As if on cue, a tree-shaking HRRRRRRRRANNNNNNNNNNNHHHHHH!!!

  From the jungle across the river.

  Mama was coming.

  The sound brought the entire tent city awake at once. There was little screaming, just barked instructions between families and the scooping up anything especially precious, like a child or a metal shovel.

  “Where the hell is Bonte?” I said in angry exasperation to Ellie, who was also looking around for any sign of our driver and friend. His assistance was essential because Atari said that he would be bolting the doors of the bunker—

  The first miners to reach the door were now discovering that it was not opening and no one was answering the intercom at th
e door. Then the security lights went out altogether and the screaming finally did start.

  “Bre-h-h-h-h-t,” came a singsong voice very near me. “E-l-l-i-e-e-e-e …”

  A walkie-talkie was on the ground not fifteen feet away from us, but of course we couldn’t see it without turning on the flashlight, and another piercing roar from the jungle, closer now, made doing that a bad idea. It was, of course, Atari: “I can see you two.”

  We spun around, looking for him in the dark.

  “From inside, dumbasses. With my infrared.”

  “I thought General Cephu smashed your infrared.”

  “I’m not even going to dignify that idiocy with a response,” Atari said, actually sounding a little miffed now. “You have about, I’d wager, one minute before the Kasai Rex—”

  Ellie said, “Actually, it’s a Spinosaurus—”

  “Actually, shut your mouth, bitch. You got about a minute until the monster comes and kills every single person closer than the guard station. If you want to live, I’ll let you in the building through the concealed door.”

  All of the miners and their families were screaming now, begging in whatever language or dialect came to them in their panic. They beat at the door and even at the concrete around the door, clawed at it. No one was getting in, and they were truly realizing that now.

  Except Ellie and I could still get in. We could still survive. She could still survive.

  “You go,” I told her. “You get inside and I’ll grab the eggs and try to appease Mama as much as possible.”

  “Smart man,” Atari mocked through the walkie-talkie, “except it’s both or nobody. Forty-five seconds now.”

  I could hear the crashing stomps of the enraged spinosaurus. It really wouldn’t be long.

  “Oh, hey, while you’re thinking about my offer, shine your flashlight over here,” his voice said from the walkie-talkie.

  I did. The spotlight showed that our friend Bonte had it strapped to his head even as he lay bound at the hands and feet with duct tape, more tape keeping his mouth sealed.