Back at camp.
"Aye, when will they be comin' back?" Jake questioned, his voice betraying his severely weakened state. Sprawling spread-eagled in the moonlight, he had been tended to by Natalie for the past few hours, the palaeontologist frantically showering water onto the gruesome laceration on his dirt-caked arm. Natalie had used Jake's torch to light several longer sticks, which all acted as makeshift standing torches as a beacon for the others.
They were also blissfully unaware that one of them had just met their untimely demise at the water's edge.
"They could be dead for all I know," Natalie answered the teen's question, "but hey, you still have me, and, well..." her voice trailed off, racking her brains to think of something touching to say. "We're going to escape here, with our limbs attached and hearts beating." she said, managing to hobble out an answer that masked how she actually felt.
If he's not back by daybreak, it's just going to be the two of us left, she thought. Poor kid here's dying, and if that's the case I'm going to be all alone for him...
As she sat down again, caressing Jake's wound with great care, she managed to catch a glimpse of an Allosaurus wandering somewhat serenely along the opposite riverbank. It caught the pungent stench of the torches burning, turned to face in their direction, but slunk away into the neighbouring forest. The chirps of Citipati and the croaks of Homalocephale echoed in the distance. The sound of water bespattering came next, a bone-smashing chomp, which both of them cringed at, and finally the rippling of the river as the crocodilian vanished without a trace into the delta's murky green depths. Whipping around to check for danger, she let loose a pent-up breath of relief.
Returning to her duty, Natalie tentatively edged towards the riverbank to scoop up more water for Jake. A large brown lump soon caught her attention, and she squinted her eyes to try and identify it. The stench of decomposition wafted into her nostrils, and she realised it was a rotting piece of flesh. The lump of flesh rolled over, and she stifled an ear-piercing shriek.
She had discovered the putrefying, eyeless, gruesomely dismembered head of Alan.
As soon as the Kaprosuchus's feet left the ground, he braced himself for its hair-splitting razors to tear the life out of him. Its twinkling eyes said it all: YOU ARE PREY
Instinct is more powerful than intelligence.
Shane's head connected with the crocodilian, which was practically flying towards its would-be victim. He scored a direct hit on its snout, but one of its tusk-like protruding fangs gashed his forehead. He felt the fresh blood trickle down his nose, which had by now turned into a fountain due to the intense humidity in the swampy marsh.
The animal was rather small, at only a little more than three metres in length, so in size it was not much more than a Guanlong, thus Shane's head colliding into it slightly disoriented the creature, causing it to fall into the quicksand as well. Just like the Simosuchus, it thrashed and writhed about violently, clapping its jaws to its free subordinate to garner its assistance. It seemed to hesitate, the reptilian stare on its face unwavering. The creature turned tail and disappeared into the thick, stolid black shadows of the mangrove swamp.
Again, Shane felt him being sucked down, this time even slower, but now the sand was mere inches away from his shoulders, his crotch about to be swallowed and he could barely stick out his tongue and taste the sand, which, of course he did not do. The Kaprosuchus had by now ceased flailing, now staring ahead with a stone-face plastered on its profile. Being lightly-built it still had barely sank in the quicksand, and still had the freedom of movement, which it began to take advantage of...
"KWAP!"
Shane felt the fabric at the back of his shirt tug, and found the animal embedding its boar teeth into this clothing, showing no signs of letting go. Suddenly, it jerked it head back fiercely, as if trying to dismember him. At the same time however, Shane felt his arms loosen ever so slightly from the quicksand. It was not much, but he could feel them rise by a couple centimetres from the quicksand. The realisation struck him as hard as the crocodilian's teeth sank into his filth-encrusted clothes.
The Kaprosuchus jerked back once more, causing his arms to loosen a little again. It continued, inadvertently allowing Shane to carry out his escape plan! Shane was almost dizzy with elation.
Five minutes passed, and his arms were nearly out. His heart was in his mouth, not out of terror but sheer euphoria. He could hear the tearing of the fabric but he knew that with every rip, he was one step closer to freedom.
"Shrak!"
"Szzt!"
The Kaprosuchus made one final jerk, it's neck rippling with power, this time with enough force to completely tear Shane's arms away from the quicksand! His arms flung out wildly, and Shane was hyperventilating upon their release. "Ok, get ahold of yourself!" he chided himself. The Kaprosuchus, left without anything else to grab onto, was left with no option but to pathetically clap its jaws in frustration.
Trying to regain his composure, the self-survival techniques that he had stumbled upon in a long-forgotten tome flooded back into his head. He had to angle it right however, as the snapping of the Kaprosuchus's jaws reminded him.
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Slowly, and steadily, he cautiously placed his back onto the quicksand, raising his arms up to prevent them from getting stuck again. Almost instantly, he felt a sort of rising feeling where his feet were at. Raising his head, he caught sight of the tips of his dirt-laced shoes jutting out of the surface. Now's my chance! he thought. Swiftly and flawlessly, he began to execute a full roll across the quicksand pit, rolling through the ensnaring liquid, before he felt the impact of dry land on his forehead. The hit agitated his wound, but he gave it the go-by. Scrambling up, he hurriedly hauled himself up before the quicksand could take effect once more.
Panting, drenched in thick slime and fallen leaves, with a deep gash scored in his forehead...but alive.
As Shane glanced up at the midnight sky, he contemplated, before unleashing a universal whoop of triumph.'
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Shane stood underneath the shade of a mangrove, leaning on its trunk. He knew he still was not out of the woods yet: Jake still needed to be healed. Yet there was one nagging question remaining in his mind.
What was that tracking collar doing on that thing?
When he first arrived in this world, Shane assumed that it was dominated by primal instinct and primal instinct alone, but that collar definitely proved otherwise. Obviously, there were humans, or at the very least a colonisation of intelligent life forms here. But if that was the case, why had he neither his fellow survivors seen them. Surely if they were humans or humanoids they would have virtually conquered the land with their technology and architecture. Shane was beginning to become overwhelmed by the thoughts, but they were pleading to be answered, to be given answers Shane could not give them. Argh, it was sickening him! He looked down for a moment to soothe himself.
"Ssshhaaaa..."
That certainly got his attention, and he glanced up again, realising the coast was still clear, before looking down again.
"SsshhAAAA..."
The hiss grew in volume, this time it definitely was not merely a figment of his imagination. Riled up and starting to go into panic mode again, his posture tensed up, ears perked and eyes peeled for signs of threats.
He looked up again.
A horrible sight greeted him. Half-submerged in the ghostly, twisted shadows cast by the mangroves, jaws steadily gaping open, was what seemed to be a grossly enlarged crocodile, standing in the twelve to thirteen-metre long range. Unblinking. Unmoving. Unfriendly. Its cold, atrocious hissing confirmed it.
Then, hauling its mighty body out of the darkness, it advanced, zeroing in, its pace steady, just like the piercing glare of its soulless eyes.
A scream ripped itself from his throat. Then he blinked. Hard.
And then, just as suddenly as it had appeared, the monster reptile was gone. "God, this swamp is messing with me!" Shane exclaimed.
Just then, the drained, fatigued Shane found a refuge in his mangrove-infested prison: what appeared to be a small, rather cramped-looking crevice just large enough for a curled-up man to fit inside. To a regular man spoiled with the riches of the city, it would be a sorry excuse of a shelter, but to Shane, weathered and hardened by the terrors and dangers of this new realm, it was a gift from the heavens. Checking once more for danger, Shane stealthily crept down to the hole, before snuggling down in his new hideout, a life saver in a deathly purgatory of a swamp.
Morning.
"Ugh...my back...yawn..."
Wiping the sleepiness out of his eyes, Shane rolled over to exit his temporary shelter, before he was greeted by a fleshy, slimy tongue snaking through the entrance. The owner of the tongue was really an Edaphosaurus, a peculiar omnivorous reptile sporting an enormous, slicked-back sail on its back, just like a certain spine-backed dinosaur familiar to many. Despite having a taste for meat as well as vegetation, it much preferred the latter, and when it did eat flesh it was from small mollusks and gastropods rather than large creatures. The animal snorted, breathing heavily into Shane's face, before ambling away from his shelter. A rude and kind of funny awakening, he thought.
Drowsily, Shane staggered reluctantly out of the tiny burrow, dragging himself out into the morning light. Instantly he felt his stomach churn. Hunger clawed at his stomach walls, yet there was nothing to satisfy it. Not a single morsel in sight. A hungry man was an angry man, so they said, and Shane was certainly disgruntled. Still, he had no options but to continue searching.
"These hunger pangs, I-I can't take them!" he complained to no one in particular as he trekked through a channel of swamp water. He craned his neck, in the hopes of possibly spotting any herbs that he had missed earlier. Of course, he failed to find any, but what he did notice was a small portion of the channel branching off to the left, the rest of the path obscured by pesky mangroves. It seemed promising enough to brave whatever could have been lurking in there. Praying for the best, he entered.
Weaving through the mangroves, Shane could not care less about the cracked bark of the trees picking at his shirt, occasionally having to wrench a mangrove aside with force. The sounds of reptilian hissing wafted from further back into the mangroves, momentarily deterring Shane. He pondered for some time, knowing full well he could be ripped to ribbons depending on what monstrosities resided beyond the branches and leaves.
"Guess it's still worth a shot. Honestly, I've already accepted I'll die here anyway." he told himself, and summoned the courage to take another step. And another, and another. Eventually, he reached the light at the end of the tunnel, but paid the price of having numerous leaves and twigs caught in his ink-black, unkempt hair.
There was just another clump of mangroves left to go, but, as a safety measure, Shane decided to peer through the gaps between the trunks, and suddenly, he was grateful for the mangroves' tangled roots.
In an instant, his heart plunged.
There stood a small pool of vomit-coloured water, foul with the scent of animal blood and thin traces of moss growing along its banks. But what mortified him was not the pool, but the animals trotting beside the pool. Not one, not two, not three, but a float of a dozen or so Kaprosuchus! Some were hunkered down with their maws stretched open, others trotting around as if patrolling their little refuge, a couple swirled about nonchalantly in the water and a handful were guarding the group of nests settled at a corner of the pool. And it was then Shane saw his prize, the thing he had swam, endured and sank into quicksand for...
The aloe vera plant, tucked neatly beside the eggs, sitting there for the taking, but it just HAD to be beside a clutch of heavily-guarded eggs! Was this all for naught? Shane wondered.