Day of the Predator

CHAPTER 26

65 million years BC, jungle

Liam wiped sweat from his brow with the back of his hand. ‘Jay-zus, it’s almost as hot as the old lady’s boiler room, so it is.’

‘Old lady?’ It was Mr Whitmore.

Liam thought the man had been far enough behind not to hear his bad-tempered mutterings. He shrugged. ‘Oh, just a… just an old ship I used to work on.’

He stopped where he was, catching his breath for a moment. The hot humid air felt heavy on his lungs. They stood still for a while, trading ragged breaths and listening to the subdued noises of the jungle around them, the tap of water dripping on waxy leaves, the creak of the tall canopy trees subtly swaying and shifting, the echoing chatter and squawk of some flying creatures far above amid the branches.

Further back down the trail he’d been hacking out with his improvised machete, he heard the others stumbling towards them: Franklyn, their resident dino expert grinning at the prehistoric jungle around him like a kid in a candy store; Lam behind him, squinting up at the bright lances of sunlight piercing down through the cathedral-like vaulted roof of arched branches and thick leaves, and Jonah Middleton whistling something tuneless as he stumbled clumsily after them. The rest of the group were back on their ‘island’ fixing a counterweight to the bridge so it could be raised and constructing a camp under Becks’s supervision.

Two days and nights they’d been here already and both nights, like clockwork, rain had come down in a torrential downpour, soaking them all and making sleep impossible. Tonight hopefully, with Becks hard at work — a one-man construction team, they’d at least have shelters to huddle beneath.

‘You used to work on a ship?’ said Whitmore, his breath wheezing past each word. ‘Was that before you became… what did you say you were — some sort of time-travelling secret agent?’

‘I didn’t really say it like that, Mr Whitmore. Did I?’

He scratched his beard. ‘I think that’s exactly what you said.’

‘Oh well, even though that does sound a little barmy, that pretty much describes me and Becks, so it does.’

Whitmore shook his head. ‘I’m still trying to get my head round this being real, you know? It’s just — ’

Liam grinned. ‘Oh, it’ll mess with your head all right. That’s for sure.’

‘You’re really from the future?’

‘Well, actually, not precisely the future as it happens.’

Whitmore looked confused by that.

Liam wondered if he should really say any more. Becks was right in that the more information they handed out to these people the greater the potential risk to blowing the agency’s anonymity. But he also figured what the heck… they were here and the future was sixty-five million years away.

Might as well be hung for a sheep as a lamb.

‘I was born in Cork, in Ireland in 1896, if you must know. And I should’ve died in 1912.’ He looked at Whitmore and his grin spread even wider. ‘Aboard a ship you might just have heard a little something about… the Titanic.’

The man’s eyes widened. Lam, Franklyn and Jonah joined them then, all five of them filling the quiet jungle with their rasping breath.

‘What’s up?’ said Lam, noticing the goggle-eyed expression on Whitmore’s face.

‘That’s… surely… that’s just impossible!’ blustered Whitmore.

‘Well now,’ replied Liam, looking around at the Cretaceous foliage, ‘you’d think all of this little pickle we’re in would be impossible, right? I mean… us lot stranded in dinosaur times?’

Whitmore ran a hand through his thinning salt and pepper hair. ‘But the Titanic… you were actually on the Titanic?’

‘Junior steward, deck E, so I was.’

Jonah pushed his frizzy fringe out of eyes that were filling his face. ‘No… way… dude!’

Lam wiped some sweat from his brow. ‘This is just getting weirder and weirder.’

‘I was recruited, see. The agency plucked me moments from death just as the ship’s spine snapped and apparently both halves went sliding under. Made no difference to time, do you see? It made no difference to history whether my bones ended up at the bottom of the Atlantic with everyone else’s or not. That’s how the agency recruits… poor fools like me who’ll never be missed.’

‘My God,’ whispered Whitmore. ‘That’s really quite incredible.’

‘What about the other one?’ asked Franklyn.

Jonah nodded appreciatively. ‘Yeah, your foxy goth girlfriend.’

Liam assumed he was referring to the support unit. ‘Becks? No… she’s, uh… she’s certainly not my girlfriend.’

‘Whatever,’ said Franklyn. ‘Where does she come from?’

Lam shook his head. ‘Maybe we should be asking when does she come from?’

Franklyn’s face stiffened at being corrected. ‘Yes… when.’

Liam decided a small white lie was better right now. Telling them she was some kind of a robot killing machine probably wasn’t the best thing to be telling them. The last thing their little group needed was a reason not to trust Becks. They all needed each other, and they certainly needed her help.

‘Oh, Becks is from the future. 2050-something or other. I guess that’s why she talks a little funny every now and then.’

‘She is kind of weird,’ said Franklyn. ‘Like Spock… or something.’

‘So, Liam, since it looks like you’re the only one who understands what’s happened here,’ said Whitmore, ‘it seems we’re all going to have to rely on you to get us home. I presume you have some sort of a plan of action? You know… beyond merely exploring our immediate surroundings.’

A plan? The closest thing to doing any ‘planning’ so far had been figuring out how he’d use the rubbish machete in his hand if a dinosaur was to suddenly emerge from the undergrowth ahead.

‘The plan?’

‘Yes,’ said Whitmore, ‘I mean… I presume there’s a way out of this mess for us, isn’t there?’

Liam could see the other three were staring expectantly at him. ‘Well, uh… well, one thing’s for sure, gentlemen. We need to stay right where we are, on that island.’

‘Why?’

‘Because it’s the exact same place that we were.’

Joseph Lam nodded. ‘The same geo-coordinates as the lab, right?’

‘That’s right. We haven’t moved an inch in position… just in time. If we happened to up sticks and move camp somewhere else, it would make it even harder for someone to find us. So we’re best staying put right where we are.’

Whitmore dabbed at his damp face with the cuff of his shirt. ‘This agency you work for… are they like a government agency? Like the CIA? Like the FBI? Something like that?’

Liam hadn’t heard of either of those. So he decided to do what he did best: bluff. ‘Sure, they’re just like them fellas, Mr Whitmore, but you know… uhh… much bigger and better, and, of course, from the future.’

‘And they’re going to come for us, right? They’re going to get us all out of here, aren’t they?’

Liam offered him a stern, confident nod. ‘Sure they are. We’ve just got to hold on here. It’ll take them a little time to find us… but they will. I assure you, they will.’

They looked at each other uncertainly, until the scraggly beard beneath Whitmore’s stubby round nose stretched with a smile. ‘Well, all right, then. I’m sure between us we’ve got enough know-how to make do for a few days.’

His smile spread to the others.

‘I’d like to see at least one dinosaur first, though,’ said Franklyn. ‘Be real lame not to.’

‘Yeah,’ said Jonah, pulling out a mobile phone from his pocket. ‘That would be, like, awesome. You know? I could stick it up on YouTube. Whoa! No!’ He pushed his frizzy mop of hair aside. ‘Better than that, dude… do it as a pay-per-download. I could make, like, millions out of this…’

Whitmore shook his head. ‘What is it with you kids these days?’

‘Opportunity,’ replied Jonah. ‘That’s what it is, my man… a golden freakin’ money-makin’ opportunity.’

Whitmore sighed.