17

From alarmingly close by comes the shaking, smashing, and splintering of sturdy trees. A stomach-churning roar sweeps you up and tosses you into a chasm of fear. Overhead, a soot-dark monstrous head, all jaw and teeth, commands every iota of your attention as it sets your heart hammering like never before. Oh, those teeth! You cannot stop staring at them. Alligator teeth, but several times bigger and with no safety barricade between you and them.

How can so large a beast be so nimble and fast? It has a grace and power you've never witnessed, never thought possible. Several old, badly healed scars adorn its snout. It's bigger than the museum skeletons. More vicious, too. Or does it just seem bigger and meaner because it's alive and a thousand times scarier than you ever imagined any predator could be?

Your pulse roars in your ears. In a few ground-shaking strides, the Tyrannosaurus rex will reach the clearing.

You thank your sensible instincts that you didn't venture into the clearing to help Kubbie.

You've been so absorbed by the events out in the clearing that it comes as a shock when the glowing green lights on the back of the RV spring to life. They're accompanied by the low hum of the time machine activating. Skyler's fingers punch a staccato on the control panel's keyboard.

The carnivore whips its massive head around frighteningly fast to growl at the camper, unleashing its carrion breath. Everyone struggles not to retch at the stench. The only person not reeling is Skyler, who keeps at the controls for the flux navigator. The T. rex plows a second trough in the ground with a clawed foot. Shivers mingle with the sweat coursing down your spine. Then all hell breaks loose.

Free-for-All