Pryce woke up and groaned.
He was becoming accustomed to being constantly sore, which was not a good sign. At least he could really give himself time to recover now that there were no pressing issues to attend to. This thought kept him in bed for another hour before he decided to finally get up.
He spent another hour feeding and cleaning the livestock, at least they seemed to be doing well. It was a shame he couldn’t let them out to graze in the forest, at least not without losing them to the raptors that could turn nearly invisible.
He still didn’t have a solution for that yet.
After finishing his chores, it was time to examine his first specimen. He would’ve liked to dissect the raptor somewhere with better lighting than the cargo hold with its small windows, but it was bright enough, and he didn’t want to spend any more time outside than he had to.
He also couldn’t bring it to the laboratory because the raptor was simply too big and heavy. Pryce had already slit its throat to reduce the weight and so that it wouldn’t bleed all over the floor of the cargo hold. Despite this measure it had still taken him half an hour of intense exertion just to drag it back to the ship. The thing was definitely more difficult to move than two people, so it was heavier than 120 kilograms at least.
The first thing he did was take detailed notes, recording the length of every important limb and digit of the specimen;
* Subject is bipedal, possessing two short arms held close to the lower torso, while on the upper torso sits a pair of bat-like membranous wings.
* Standing height: ~1.5 meters.
* Length: ~4 meters from nose to tail-tip
* Wingspan: ~3 meters
* Mass: ___
* Feet: 25 cm in length, 14 cm in width.
* …
On and on the list went, until Pryce measured everything he could think of measuring.
Wingspan was difficult to measure with rigor mortis making its muscles stiff, but Pryce estimated it to be about 3 meters. They didn’t seem quite big enough to be used for true flight, so he assumed it was for other purposes like gliding, maybe they even aided in running somehow.
Mass was trickier given the sheer bulk of the creature, the mechanical scale was too small to hold all of it at once, so Pryce set up the hanging scale. He spent half an hour tying up the raptor so he could hook it up properly, which involved a few knots he learned during training. Then he attached a snatch block, which was basically a collection of pulleys with a mechanical advantage of 8 to the hanging scale.
He took a step back and pulled, the raptor coming up easily. Thanks to the magic of pulleys, the raptor was 8 times easier to pull up than it would have been without the machine, though each tug only resulted in it moving up an eighth of the distance he was pulling.
In a few minutes he had the scale’s reading: 150.3 kilograms. Assuming 6% of mass was in the drained blood, the raptor should have been around 160 kilograms when it was alive.
Setting down the raptor, he untied the ropes and realized he should take a photo before dissecting it. He decided to move the carcass out onto the beach, as there was not enough light in the cargo hold for a proper photo.
He let the hatch clunk its way to the down position again, diligently training a rifle at what he hoped was just sand. Nothing seemed out of the ordinary, so he knelt as far down as he could go and looked along the ground.
This was one method he had devised to see the predators; while their camouflage was amazing, it still had limits. If the entirety of the skin was sand-colored, then it would stand out against any other background. The creature was too large to lie flat, so it should be easy to see any camouflaged raptors this way. The downside was that if a raptor was close enough for him to see, it would probably be close enough to kill him before he could get a shot off.
Another deterrent was to simply plant many sticks all over the beach, which would make it impossible for them to blend in. The downside for that was that he would need a lot of long branches for it to be effective, and branches were found in the forest…yeah, that plan needed some improvement.
A thud snapped Pryce out of his thoughts, the hatch had finished lowering itself.
Then a second thud on the port side of the ship, beyond the walls.
Pryce froze. His heartbeat quickened as he stared at the wall, then at the open hatch. He raised his rifle and silently inched his way to the exit.
But then the faces of his dead crewmates came to his mind, and he paused in hesitation.
Don’t be stupid, don’t be reckless, and think.
What am I doing?
Investigating a noise caused by an animal.
What do I have to lose?
My life.
What do I have to gain?
…
He quickly but quietly closed the door shut. The interior door was solidly built, but not anywhere near as durable as the outer door, which took minutes to crank up and down.
It would have to do.
He waited. And waited. No noises.
As silently as he could, he scrambled up to the deck of the ship.
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Before he stepped out onto the deck, he took off his shoes and made sure to calm his breathing to walk as silently as possible. He didn’t want to scare off whatever was on the beach now that he was in an advantageous position.
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He walked heel-toe to the starboard side of the ship, then aimed the rifle where he estimated the thud had come from.
And there it was, a raptor standing right next to the hull, staring straight at him. So much for the element of surprise. It was significantly bigger than the one he had killed earlier, and come to think of it, the specimen had feet that were smaller than the raptor footprints he had found on day 21. Was that one a juvenile or a young adult? That would explain its daring behavior.
But something was wrong – the predator was a mottled brown and green, very visible against the sandy background. It wasn’t bothering to blend into the beach at all, why?
It might be a different species incapable of camouflage, but it looked identical in terms of conformity.
Now that he thought about it, the thud Pryce heard almost sounded…deliberate, intentional. Predators usually aren’t clumsy enough to make such a loud noise when hunting. It was almost like it was meant to lure him out, almost as if…the raptor wanted to be seen.
If this one was the bait, then where was the trap?
Pryce looked underneath the brow of the ship and noticed an unusually large lump of sand just out of line of sight from the exit hatch. Under normal circumstances he might have overlooked them, but he had long since learned to embrace paranoia in his brief stay on this island. Piles like that didn’t just form naturally, but it also wasn’t big enough to be a hidden raptor. That left one possibility…
Pryce saw he had left the binoculars on a stool from when he spent a day watching for wildlife. Picking it up, he examined the strange sand lump, and after a few moments he found it.
The clever bastard had buried most of its body in the sand, with only its camouflaged head out on the surface. This made the raptor seem much smaller than it actually was, and it had almost tricked him.
Pryce walked as silently as he could to the north side of the ship, at this point he couldn’t put anything past these creatures. Then leaned over the bulwark to point the rifle at…nothing? He stared, trying to determine if there was in fact anything there at all. Several more moments of inspection later and he was fairly certain there was nothing near the ship on that side.
Why had they come to stake him out now? Why not earlier? The only thing he did recently was – ah, he killed one of their own. A smaller one, perhaps their offspring?
Pryce felt a little unease at that thought, he didn’t know how intelligent these creatures were, what if they were sapient? They were certainly very intelligent at least. He realized he had never actually been attacked before he struck first and killed one of their own.
He shook his head; he couldn’t afford sympathy now. No predator sneaks up on something without malicious intent. If they had peaceful intentions, they would have tried to communicate. Unless the raptor was just hiding…?
He cast away his doubt, either way he had a problem to solve. The raptors were hostile now, nothing he could do about that, so the real question he should be asking was which was he going to shoot first?
This wasn’t a strategy the raptors just came up with, they definitely had practice. The one in the sand could probably spring out in a flash, but not as fast as the one acting as bait could start running.
Why hadn’t they fled yet? Probably because they didn’t know he could kill them from a distance. Given how intelligent they were, he’d have to kill them both at once lest a survivor try to plan around that.
He aimed at the ‘bait’ raptor, and fired.
It was a height of 10 meters from the beach to the deck of the ship; he could hardly miss from such a distance. The raptor jerked but made no noise, and at the same time the sand before the brow of the ship exploded with activity. Pryce recovered from the recoil, then pivoting he aimed and fired at the fleeing raptor.
A puff of sand in front of the raptor shot into the air – a miss. His shoulder already smarted from the first round, so it took him more time to line up his third shot. By the time he was ready the raptor had reached the treeline – either it was unharmed or running on adrenaline.
He fired one last time, and a second crack immediately followed his third shot as a tree trunk exploded. There was no shriek of pain, at least none that he heard; his ears still rang from the three shots he fired in rapid succession. Pryce collapsed onto the deck of the ship, rubbing his aching shoulder as he felt the adrenaline leaving his system.
He took a few shaky breaths, and then slammed his fist into the deck.
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He was getting really tired of constantly looking over his shoulder, but he kept an eye out as he examined the beach.
The freshly reloaded rifle slung over his shoulder, and he inspected where the buried predator had hidden. There was a faint trail of blood leading into the forest, so he had grazed it with his first shot, though doubted the injury was fatal. Pryce huffed, adding a vengeful and nearly invisible predator to the list of things he needed to watch out for.
Next, he examined and took measurements from the raptor he had killed, it was definitely bigger than the first one – 1.8 meters tall, 5 meters long, and much heavier than the initial specimen.
It would take some thinking and strategically placed pulleys to measure the mass of this one. Perhaps he would rig up something along the bulwark of the ship. At least the raptor had been kind enough to place itself in an ideal position, Pryce thought spitefully as he glared at the predator.
This was turning into a real problem, first there was one, then two, how many would come next?
If he was lucky, the raptors only lived in small families. If not, then he might have a major problem to deal with soon. He’d have to put the dissections on hold for now; there was no time for that.
It was time to raptor-proof the beach.
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[JOURNAL ENTRY]
Day 25
More bad news today, it seems killing the raptor yesterday has attracted two others. My best guess is these are relatives or parents, as the second specimen is significantly larger than the first (measurements listed in the post-script)
I am a little shaken to think that if I had gone out to inspect the noise today, I would currently be dead.
Given what I’ve seen today, I can only conclude that these creatures are incredibly intelligent, capable of setting up elaborate traps for their prey. I cannot underestimate them any longer.
I checked the trail of blood, which was little more than a few droplets. I expect more will be back soon, perhaps tomorrow.
In anticipation of their attack, I have hammered steel rebar rods into the beach and stitched various pieces of colorful clothing together. Strewn about the beach like oversized flags, they should make it much harder for a raptor to sneak up on me.
I will spend tomorrow perched on the deck of the ship to keep a lookout where they cannot reach me. If I must confront them, I will do it after I have recovered.
Besides, I have some ideas to lure them closer without risking my life. I’ll be damned if I’m outsmarted by a (not actual) dinosaur.
P.S.
Measurements
Raptor Specimen #1:
* Standing height: ~1.5 meters.
* Length: ~4 meters from nose to tail-tip
* Wingspan: ~3 meters
* Mass: 150.3 kg (drained of blood, est. 160 kg alive)
* Feet: 25 cm in length, 14 cm in width.
* …
Raptor Specimen #2:
* Standing height: ~1.8 meters.
* Length: ~5.6 meters from nose to tail-tip
* Wingspan: ~3.3 meters
* Mass: 410.5 kg (drained of blood, est. 440 kg alive)
* Feet: 30 cm in length, 15 cm in width.
* …