The Dinosaur Four (29 page)

Before it reached the
forest, the giant beast made the same u-turn William had taken, stepping up onto the low cliff ledge. It had not spotted Tim. The tyrannosaur plodded along the top of the cliff, sending an avalanche of rocks over the edge with each footstep.

A stitch in William’s side stopped him, along with the certainty that he was now safe. The tyrannosaur could snap at him all it wanted from the clearing below, just as it had that morning. William gasped for air, holding the time device against his thighs. He looked down, trying to find Al.
Why?
It seemed as if Al had thrown a rock at him. Or at the dinosaur.
Why did you do that?
He was equally confused and angry.

His heavy breathing masked the sound of the
tyrannosaur behind him.

Tim’s stomach lurched. William kept them together. When they started bickering, William calmed them down. When they weren’t sure what to do, William decided. William was the one who would take Tim home to Julie.

He stepped out into the clearing and
screamed,
“WILLIAM, RUN!”

William turned
around as the tyrannosaur loomed over him. He raised the football above his head like a shield.

The time device.

Tim felt as if he was drowning, sucking for air, but unable to breathe.

The
massive jaws of the tyrannosaur came down over the football and clamped on William’s chest. Nine-inch teeth closed together through William’s torso until they touched. The dinosaur opened its mouth back up and slurped in the delivery man’s hips and legs before they could fall away, leaving no trace of the man or the machine.

I just killed a man
, Al thought.

Atop the cliff, the tyrannosaur looked at the drop-off below and
suddenly seemed uncomfortable. A fall from that height would be a death sentence. It turned, shouldered through the saplings, and disappeared into the woods above.

Al
had fantasized about killing people plenty of times before. Who hadn’t? Most recently, he had wanted to strangle his sister, Deborah, who nagged him endlessly about finding a girl and settling down.
As if it was that goddamn easy.

Al knew better. Very few people got away with murder. He was quite sure that if he ever actually hurt anyone, he would b
e caught, prosecuted by some prick like Hank, and then sent to prison for the rest of his life. Even if it was justified. At least, that was true in modern times. Here, there wasn’t a single cop or prison on the face of the planet. And now, thanks to that big dinosaur in the ocean, there wasn’t even a single prosecutor.

He
picked up the shovel and stepped out from behind the upturned roots and strode straight across the clearing. He felt a warm feeling of satisfaction. The time machine was gone. He and Lisa would stay here forever.

There was no longer any need to skirt along the rock wall.
The sun had moved beyond the top of the cliff, leaving the entire clearing in shadow. Al took note of the Triceratops as he passed it. A huge hunk of meat remained on its back right leg. It could provide food for weeks, if properly cleaned and cooked. Smoked, maybe. Al wasn’t sure how to preserve meat, but if primitive humans could figure it out, he thought he could, too.

For now, though, he needed to focus on the next few minutes. What had Tim MacGregor seen? He had surely heard
Al shout at William to freeze, but Tim himself had shouted for William to run, just a few minutes later. Al’s shout had been intended to make sure the dinosaur was fully awake, but there was no way Tim could know that. He needed to find out if Tim had seen him throw the rocks.

He found Tim sitting on a
small boulder in the woods. Al gripped the shovel in both hands as he approached.
If he suspects anything, you’ve only got one chance here, Stevens.
Tim was leaner and quicker, but Al outweighed him by at least fifty pounds and Al had the shovel.

He stopped and
stood before Tim. “What the hell happened? I couldn’t see.” Then, hoping he wasn’t pushing it, “Where is William?”

Tim looked up, shaking his head slowly.
His eyelids closed together, forming narrow slits. He was either furious or devastated. Al couldn’t tell which.

Squeezing the handle of the shovel,
Al wondered what would work better, a wide swing or a straight jab with the end of the blade. He wondered if he could bring himself to actually do it, up close and personal.
If he knows, I don’t have any choice. I have to do it.
He would hide Tim’s body in the Triceratops carcass. None of the women would ever go near that thing. Al wrung his hands around the handle, waiting for a reply.

Finally Tim spoke. “He’s gone. And so is the
time machine. Gone.”

“Shit
. What happened?”

“It woke up. It chased him up the cliff.”
Tim glared with anger. Al still couldn’t tell what he knew.

Al nodded and pretended to
slowly understand. “
That’s
what it was doing. I hid under the roots of that tree when it woke up. When I finally looked out, it was walking off into the woods up there.”

Tim stared
up at Al without saying anything.

Al offered a hand.
He would plunge the shovel blade into Tim’s neck as he pulled him up.
You’ve only got one shot here.
If Tim got away and ran back to Lisa, he would be doomed
.

Tim looked at the silent woods around them. He seemed to compose himself.
“So what do we do now?”

“We survive,” Al said. “That’s all we can do.”

Tim nodded and took Al’s hand. “We should have listened to you.” Al pulled him to his feet.

“Come on, Tim. Let’s get back to the girls.”

Lisa rushed into Al’s arms when he stepped into the café. He pulled her close and
hid his face in her hair. He felt like picking her up and twirling her around. He always sneered when men did that in the movies, but right now he wanted to. Instead, he buried his growing smile against her neck.

“Callie told us what happened,” Lisa
whispered. “She told us about Hank and Morgan, but you guys found the football. We can undo everything. You did it!”

Al tensed up.

“What is it, Al?”

What is it?
The woman he had loved for three years just ran into his arms. He had never been happier in his life. The smell of the sweat on her neck was delicious. He felt an urge to open his mouth and taste it. Instead, he shook his head slowly and kept his mouth closed.

“William is dead,” Tim announced. “The
Tyrannosaurus killed him.”

“Oh my God,
” Lisa cried. She squeezed Al even tighter.

Al trembled against her. She would interpret it as despair. He steeled his face so that no emotion showed and finally pulled away.

Helen sat on the orange couch where Callie tended to a new bandage on her arm. Callie froze, her lower lip quivering. “No. No. No.” She looked from Tim to Al. Her breaths came short and quick. “Where’s the time machine?
Where is it?
”

Now they all looked to Tim, eyes wide and mouths gaping.

“It’s gone. William was holding it when he died. It ate the device.”

Helen
covered her lips with her fingers. Callie brought her fists up to her face and shook. Buddy let out a low whimper at Callie’s feet.

Al looked
out the open window. Late day sunlight touched the tops of the trees along the river. It would be night soon. Their first night.

“
What are we supposed to do now?” Lisa asked, looking from one person to the next.

“We survive,” Al said. Now that the device was gone, it was that simple. Surely
they could understand that much.

Helen
grunted, “Our track record for surviving hasn’t been so great, young man. We lost half our group in less than a day.”

“Hank is
gone
,” Callie cried.

She
looked comatose, the way she had looked on the beach. Al supposed that to her, she had lost Hank all over again, now that the fail-safe was gone. Which was total bullshit, when you thought about it. They all needed to get beyond that nonsense if they were going to stay alive. “Listen, Callie, the plan was never going to work. I mean, if you think it through, it falls apart.”

Everyone gave him the same harsh glare
. Lisa backed away.

He
realized he had to spell it out. “Okay, look. Let’s say we made it home. Then we were supposed to use the fail-safe to go back in time twenty minutes.”

“
Yeah. That was the plan,” Tim said. “Why are we even talking about this?” Al thought he looked ready for a fight.

Al went on. “Right. That was the plan. So we go back twenty minutes and then walk into the café and tell ourselves to clear out of there. Then what?”

Tim circled closer as he answered. “The café would have gone back in time, but it would be empty. None of us would be inside. We were also going to try to stop the researchers upstairs from using the device at all.” He faced Al straight on. “What’s the problem?”

Al fought to keep himself from rolling his
eyes. “Telling them not to use the device has its own set of problems, but forget about that for now.
Who
would have been in the café when we got there?”

Callie answered this one. “All of us. All ten of us. Hank is in the café. And Beth and William. Everyone.”

“And where are you in this scenario?”

“In the café. I just told you that. I was in the café too, dumbass.”

Now Al did roll his eyes. “Not
that
you.” He waggled his finger at her. “This you.
You
you.” Al continued, speaking slowly. “There’s the Callie in the café, running out into the street so that she doesn’t go back in time and a second Callie,
you
, standing there telling her to get out.”

Callie no
dded. “That’s right. So what?” She jabbed at her chest. “This me will go back forward twenty minutes with the device.”

Al nodded. He looked around to be sure everyone was with him before he continued. “When the device
takes us back forward twenty minutes, where does that land us? Back in a world where we all just arrived from dinosaur time. A world where Hank is still dead.”

“You don’t know that,” Callie spat. “
You don’t know how any of this works.”

“Yeah, that’s for sure,” Al said. “But think about it. What other possibility is there?
Are the timelines going to merge back together? Is the Callie who just spent fifteen hours in the land of the lost going to be reunited with the Hank who avoided the trip? No, because that Hank has a different Callie right next to him, who also avoided the trip.”

Callie looked ready to burst into sobs.

“Why would you say this?” Helen asked. “I don’t even understand what you are saying, but all you’re doing is hurting that poor girl.”

“I’m trying to
help
her.” His voice grew louder and faster. “We lost the device. It’s gone. But the fact of the matter is that the time machine never would have saved her boyfriend. I thought it would make her feel better, knowing that it didn’t matter. It wouldn’t have worked anyway.”

Al stared at Tim, who
still stood directly in front him.
You want to hit me, don’t you?
He almost hoped it would happen. Tim would look like the asshole for a change and Al would be the victim. Maybe that would at least earn him some sympathy.

“You took away her hope,”
Helen said quietly.

Al rubbed the back of his neck. “There’s
still
hope. We aren’t doomed to die here.” How they could not see that was beyond him. “We still have a chance here.”

Tim
glared at him. “A chance? What kind of chance do you really think we have? It’s been less than a day and we’ve already lost five people.” He clenched his fists. “At this rate, we’ll all be dead tomorrow.” He jabbed a finger at Al, connecting with the top of his chest. Al flinched.

“Tim,” Lisa called. “We aren’t going to survive if we beat each other up.”

“
Thank you.”
Al nodded eagerly. Lisa had just come to his rescue. She was on his side
.
He squared his jaw and looked at Tim. “Listen, we’ve been scared, rushed and confused. If we stay focused and work together, we can survive here. We can even have a life here.”

“A life?” Callie sputtered. “Like, what? Raise some kids and teach them about the
good old days back in the future when we had cars and doctors and supermarkets? And then watch them get eaten alive or trampled to death? No thanks.”