Darwin's Quest: The Search for the Ultimate Survivor by Jonathan P. Brazee Page B

little fucked up around here right now. And I think we need to see what is going on. Or aren’t you brave enough to act on your own?”
    The rest of us looked on in surprise. Direct challenges like this were rare in the game. They had a habit of backfiring on the challenger. But Hamlin seemed to be considering it. Or rather, he was probably considering how this might look to the viewers. He probably wanted to tell Josh to take a flying leap into the River Beagle below us, but would he look like a coward if he backed down? And did the producers want to goad us into acting on our own? If they did, then it would be rather easy for Baako Silver to swing opinion one way or the other, and that would affect the voting.
    Hamlin chose to make it look like he didn’t care one way or the other. He shrugged, came back, and started crossing the bridge. By him taking the lead, it looked like he was back in charge. Josh scowled, obviously realizing that he had given some momentum back to Hamlin, but he hurried after, quickly followed by the rest of us.
    When we got to the other side, we decided that as I had the only Spear 2.0, I would take the point. I cautioned everyone to keep their distance in case we needed to make a speedy getaway. Spear point preceding me, I slowly moved down the trail. The more I thought about it, the more this seemed like a stupid idea. Facing a Challenge was one thing. We all signed on the dotted line for that. But to volunteer to face something, well that seemed downright stupid. But it was too late to back down by then.
    As we got further from the river, the noise ahead of us became clearer. And something, or somethings were up ahead of us making a racket. We could hear growls, whistles, and grunts, and they sounded pretty cantankerous. I slowed and became more tense. I initially was afraid that Mr. T-Rex had come back for a visit, but whatever these were, they weren’t that big. Big enough for problems, maybe, but not T-Rex big.
    I held up my hand to stop Josh in back of me. We were close now. I edged forward a bit and saw a flash of bright blue and yellow, like an Amazon macaw, but bigger than any macaw ever hatched. I moved up around the last bush and almost lost my lunch. There were three of them about fifteen meters ahead of me on the trail. Three bright blue and yellow dinosaurs, maybe raptors. They were about a meter and a half high at the hips, and maybe three meters long from head to tail. And they were fighting over the last remaining scraps of Paul.
    I slowly started backing up, my hand waving frantically in back of me for Josh and the rest to back up. I assume Josh was backing up as well because I didn’t run into him. I wasn’t about to look, though, as my eyes were glued to the trail ahead even though I was then out of sight of the carnivores.
    “What’s going on up there?” I think it was Ratt who shouted out.
    In front of me, the squalling ceased. I froze. I heard the sound of snuffing as three sets of lungs drew in the air. One of them let out a whistle, and I could hear the scrambling of clawed feet.
    I turned around. “Run!” I screamed and then proceeded to follow my own advice. I could hear them crashing behind us as we ran pell-mell down the trail. I expected them to be on me at any moment. I risked one look back and saw teeth coming my way, maybe ten meters behind me. I put on a burst of speed and got into the clearing. Lindadawn was already on the bridge, Hamlin and Josh in front of me. The others were already in Haven, and I didn’t stop to wonder how they got there so fast.
    I had already been killed by one dinosaur right there, and I was not going to get killed again. I bolted past the professional football player and pushed through the body builder to fall on top of him on the bridge, knocking both of us down and sending Lindadawn bouncing up in the air. She held on as I scrambled off Hamlin and lunged forward a few meters. I was launched up myself as Josh threw himself