Footprints of Thunder (38 page)

Luis quickly scanned the meadow looking for other dinosaurs. There were none, but in the distance he saw the faint, image of buildings. Hadn’t he stood in Mrs. Weatherby’s window, seeing similar buildings? Then, just as before, the shimmering image faded away. He shook his head in confusion. His cracked skull must have scrambled his brains. It was too much for Luis. He wanted out of there and could think of only one way to do it.

Luis dug the bag of sugar out of his box, walked to Mrs. Weatherby’s garden and then into the meadow—Luis walked gingerly, expecting the meadow grass to disappear like a mirage at any second. When he saw movement ahead he froze in his tracks—the tops of the grass were moving. Luis watched carefully, and when he was sure it was gone, he ripped open the top of the bag and poured a pile of sugar in the grass. Then he retreated quickly out of the meadow, poured another pile by Mrs. Weatherby’s garden and three more piles leading to the corner of the building. At the corner, with part of the bag still left, Luis sat down to wait.

Mariel rocked in her chair, occasionally sipping her tea. The meadow was still, and she made good progress on her crocheting, quickly finishing one square and starting another. Time passed pleasantly and soon a familiar figure appeared in the distance.

The iguanodon was coming straight toward her window, and it was time to get his treat ready. Mariel walked to the kitchen and measured out two sacks of sugar, reminding herself to search the rest of the apartments for more. Still, she had quite a supply now, brown sugar, powdered sugar, Karo syrup, and molasses, anything she thought might please a dinosaur’s sweet tooth.

Mariel took her bags back to the window to wait for the dinosaur’s “aaah” sound. She hadn’t been able to break him of the noise and had finally given up. It had been irritating at first, but now she thought it kind of cute—a big monster like the iguanodon singing for his supper. Mariel thought about that late-night show where people brought their dogs on TV to do stupid tricks. What would they think of the iguanodon and his “aaahing”? She chuckled to herself while she pictured the look on the host’s face when the iguanodon walked out onstage and chuckled again as she watched the dinosaur striding through the meadow. He would scare any audience to death. They wouldn’t know he was a gentle giant.

Mariel watched the iguanodon approach in his usual way until he neared the edge of the meadow. Suddenly he stopped and bent to sniff the meadow grasses^ Then he backed up and began eating something. It wasn’t grass, because when he ate grass he ripped it up and then stood to chew it, looking around. Then he did something strange again. The iguanodon sniffed the air and then turned away from Mariel’s window, stopping to eat something off the asphalt, Mariel leaned out the window and spotted Luis standing by the corner of the building. What was Luis doing here? Mariel wondered. Why wasn’t he home with his family? She pulled her head in, picked up her bags of sugar, and left the apartment.

Luis stood with his back to the wall, watching the dinosaur walk to the next sugar pile, which it devoured eagerly. From the window, Luis had been afraid of the dinosaur, but up close it was terrifying. Its head was massive, bigger than an elephant’s, and covered with thick leathery skin. Its mouth contained rows of huge teeth; its back legs were gigantic and its front legs thick and powerful. Worst of all its forelegs carried thumb spikes large enough to skewer a human being. Luis gained a new respect for Mrs. Weatherby.

When it finished the sugar it stared quizzically at Luis, who poured another pile by the corner of the building. When the dinosaur moved toward the new pile Luis ducked around the corner and walked toward the cars.

Mariel stepped out of the building by her garden just in time to see Luis disappear around the end of the building, the iguan-odon following him toward the corner. He shouldn’t be there, Mariel knew. That’s where all the horn blowing and some of the shooting came from. She hurried down the side of the building toward the iguanodon, who was busy eating something off of the ground at the corner. When he finished he lifted his head and sniffed the air. Mariel was afraid he was going to step into the alley, so she shouted to him.

“Wait, wait!”

The dinosaur turned its head and looked her over. Then he walked toward her, his head lowered. When he reached her his mouth opened and the “aahing” sound began. Mariel poured the first bag of sugar into his mouth and then waited while he went through his slurping and lip-licking routine. After the second bag, Mariel pushed on his jaw, told him to go back to the meadow, then left him and walked to the corner to find Luis.

Luis poured another pile of sugar halfway down the street and then walked up to the car barrier. The men behind the barrier—one wearing a red coat—were staring at him. Two of the men held pistols. One man spat something over the car he was leaning on and yelled at Luis.

“Whatcha doin, asshole?”

He wasn’t wearing a red jacket. Luis, while relieved, still ignored him and poured more sugar.

“I’m talking to you, asshole!”

Luis looked up slowly and feigned ignorance. “You talking to me? Oh, I’m feeding my pet dinosaur.”

The man came around the car and walked toward Luis, who could see a pistol in his belt. He leaned near Luis with an icy stare, and reached up, revealing a tattoo on the back of his hand—a shrunken head, the symbol of the Zombies. His voice was as cold as his stare.

“I don’t like smart ass assholes.”

Luis stepped forward holding out his bag of sugar.

“Really, I’m feeding my pet dinosaur. It’s sugar, see.”

He poured the sugar at the man’s feet, careful not to get it on the man’s shoes.

One of the Zombie’s friends suddenly yelled, “Hey, Barton. Ain’t ya gonna charge him the toll?”

Barton never took his eyes off of Luis. He merely rubbed his tattooed hand across his stomach just above the butt of his gun.

“Give me your wallet,” Barton ordered.

“I haven’t got one. Really, I was mugged yesterday.”

“You better have something, man, if you want to get out of here alive.” The Zombie pulled his gun, pointing it at Luis’s stomach and stepped closer.

“I’m telling you the truth, I haven’t got anything but this sugar.”

“Yeah, you told us. Your pet dinosaur and all that shit.” In a flash of lights and pain, the gun slammed into the lump on Luis’s head and he collapsed to the street. Even after his pain was gone, Luis continued to writhe, trying to convince Barton he couldn’t respond to threats. Then, someone behind the car hollered to Barton that something was coming down the alley.

When Mariel turned the corner she saw Luis at the end of the street, talking to some men by the cars. They looked dangerous, not like the kind of men Luis should be associating with. Mariel walked down the street, intending to get Luis back to his family where he belonged. She also wanted to ask him why he was feeding her iguanodon. Suddenly the man closest to Luis hit him, knocking him to the ground. Luis held the left side of his head, the same place he had been bit before. Mariel was angry now, angry and reckless. She strode down the street to help Luis and tell those men what she thought of them, with words she seldom used.

The men behind the cars saw her and shouted to the man leaning over Luis. The man who’d hit Luis looked up and stared blankly at Mariel, irritating her. She wanted him to be afraid or ashamed, and she certainly didn’t want to be treated as if she weren’t even there. Her face flushed, and she set her jaw. This man needed a slap. Suddenly the man’s eyes went wide. Now he was afraid and Mariel felt satisfaction, until she saw he was looking past her. Then he turned and ran around behind the cars to where his friends were hiding. Mariel was puzzled. Now they were all pointing down the street and jabbering. Mariel turned to see what all the excitement was about and saw the iguanodon coming between the buildings, walking upright, taking long powerful strides.

Mariel remembered the men had guns and she turned to warn them not to fire.

“He won’t hurt you. I’ll take care of him. Let me send him back to his meadow.” Her words fell on deaf ears. The men were so terrified by the size and fearsome appearance of the iguanodon, they weren’t listening. Still, they held their fire.

Mariel knew the iguanodon was in danger, and she pushed out her arms trying to send him back. On he came, however, oblivious of the danger. As he approached Mariel he began to bend, coming slowly over and lowering his head until he was down on all fours just behind her. Still the men held their fire. Mariel stepped forward and pushed on the dinosaur’s jaw, telling him to go away. The dinosaur held its ground, then slowly the huge jaws opened to their full expanse. Mariel found herself staring in the iguanodon’s cavernous mouth as a deep rumbling began and out came a loud “aaaaaaaaaahhhhhhh!” From the far end of the barrier a shot rang out. A hole appeared just behind the dinosaur’s jaw. His mouth snapped shut at the impact and he stared into Mariel’s eyes for a few heartbeats. Then he reared, rising to his full height and screaming at the same time. Every pistol behind the barrier fired and Mariel watched bloody holes pepper the thick skin of the iguanodon’s neck.

Mariel’s heart ached and she screamed for the shooting to stop. It didn’t. More holes appeared along his neck and chest. Sobbing, she ran toward the shooting men waving her arms. Then just as quickly as it began the shooting ended. Mariel turned to see the wounded dinosaur walking down the street toward his meadow. He was walking upright, but slowly, his head hung low. A low rumbling groan came from his throat with each jarring step.

“Oh, no. Don’t go!” Mariel called after him. “Please come back.” But he didn’t. She went after him, hurrying to catch up. She heard Luis shout something behind her, but she ignored him. All she could see and hear was her injured iguanodon friend.

The dinosaur strode out into the meadow- Mariel chased behind, trying to catch up, but even, injured, the iguanodon’s giant stride kept him moving ahead.

At the meadow she found a new horror awaiting her. The crushed grass that marked the iguanodon’s trail was smeared with blood. Her tears began to flow again. “Oh no,” she whispered over and over, “oh no!” Then Mariel wiped her eyes and followed the bloody trail.

Groggy, Luis got to his feet, but he staggered when he stepped toward his building. He heard laughter behind him. Barton and the others were bragging about how many bullets they put into the dinosaur.

“Pow, man, right in the jaw. Did you see my shot, man?”

“Your shot? Sheee-it. My shot. Believe it.”

“Believe shit, man.”

Inside, Luis sat on the stairs to rest. When his head cleared a little and the spinning subsided, he climbed the stairs slowly, pausing on each one. He made the third floor and staggered down the hall into Mrs. Weatherby’s apartment—to her rocking chair by the window. He collapsed and rocked gently. When his head stopped throbbing he opened his eyes and looked out the window into the meadow. The last thing Luis saw before sleep took him was the iguanodon walking slowly into the meadow followed by a small figure.

39. Black Ripple

The weakest force in nature is gravity. It takes the entire mass of the earth just to make a leaf fall to the ground. But condense the mass of the earth to the size of a marble, and you have a black hole, where the laws of time and space, as we know them, cease to exist.

—
Merlin Constantine,
Of Time and Space

Washington, D.C.

PostQuilt:
Tuesday, 8:00
A.M.
EST

T
he President was more than tired. He was afraid, and he was desperate.

Nick had taken the President’s alien theory as a naive attempt to cover all possibilities, but Nick wasn’t as sure now. He saw the President as a drowning man, grasping at straws.

The President would be open to Nick’s new theory—but perhaps too open. The President spoke calmly and in a controlled manner, but his fingers told another story as he reflexively twirled a twisted paper clip. Nick looked up to catch Elizabeth Hawthorne’s eye. Normally inscrutable, now she looked worried—about what had happened, or about the President? Nick wondered.

The order of reports on the agenda was the same, and Nick had to wait through the military assessments again. There was still no identified strategic threat, so the reports focused on losses. In addition to the loss of the ELF system, contact had been lost with seven military bases in the United States, including one SAC bomber base, several bases on foreign soil, an aircraft carrier group, and several other individual ships. There were also communication problems with some Landsat and civilian weather satellites and loss of contact with some military KH 13 satellites. Until contact could be reestablished, the military was substituting aerial reconnaissance of the affected areas.

Samuel Cannon’s report included a confirmation that all of the black bag projects were suspended, as the President had ordered. The CIA’s report also included a surprise: no confirmation of the dinosaurs in Oregon, but a confirmed report of dinosaurs in Quebec, with photos. The CIA director’s aide passed around copies. Nick had trouble believing what he was seeing. The heavily armored animal walking past a barn was five feet at the shoulders and fifteen feet in length. Its body was bulky, but the head was small for an animal this size, and its tail was as armored as the rest of the body and tipped with two spikes. It looked like an overgrown armadillo. Cannon reported their experts identified it as a living ankylosaur—an animal extinct since the end of the Cretaceous period.