Monster Girl Base 5 Chapter 4

“Fuck, fuck, fuck,” I said and looked behind us.

The forest had grown quiet except for the mournful screech of the dinosaurs and the crunch of dried leaves beneath the wheels of our cart. It was like the trees had sucked up the breeze that had drifted by only a few seconds ago, and they were waiting to see what would happen.

“The dinosaurs must’ve come back,” Emma whispered in a high pitched voice.

“They might have been gathering food for the hatchlings,” Fela said and her pupils dilated to saucers. “Their scent was weak, so they must have been on a long hunt.”

I glanced behind me as another shriek tore through the air, and Floppy picked up his speed. The miniature woolly mammoth was almost at a jog despite his heavy burden, and the jars of water began to jingle and clink so loud that I thought that they might break.

“Woah, woah,” I said and ran to catch up to the frightened creature. “You can’t make too much noise or they’ll find us.”

The furry creature threw a look over his shoulder, and I saw that his molten brown eyes were wide with fear while his breaths came out in panicked huffs. His ears flapped against him, but he did slow down enough that the water jars weren’t in danger of cracking. He huffed and strained at his binds, and his trunk sniffed the air for any signs that our pursuers were close by.

“We should get back to the base,” my sabertooth girlfriend said. “We will be safer in our home.”

“Let’s hurry,” I said. “Floppy, move as fast as you can without making too much noise.”

I checked my watch to see the compass pointed straight ahead. The numbers showed that we were almost there, so all we had to do was outrun the dinosaurs, and then we could hide inside of the shipping container. I just hoped that it wasn’t raptor eggs that we’d nestled with our water.

“Does it sound like they’re getting closer?” the ebony haired woman asked and picked up her skirts to walk faster.

“Probably,” I said and hazarded a glance behind me. “We’re almost there.”

“Should we leave the eggs?” Raz asked with a dubious look towards the shiny shelled orbs.

“They might come after us regardless,” Fela said and unsheathed her claws. “Some creatures will take revenge for their young.”

“Good point,” I said with a shrug. “We took the risk to steal the eggs, so we might as well keep them.”

The trees began to thin out as we neared the camp, and I recognized the stripped ferns that the triceratops had nibbled on over the last couple of days. I looked at the three eggs that jolted with every tug at the cart and hoped that it would be worth it. They would at least be good for food, if we survived, and we might even get a pet dinosaur out of the deal.

“There’s the camp!” Emma gasped and picked up her speed.

The forest opened up to reveal the perfect circle that our arrival had created. Honest Abe sat anchored in the middle of the base, and the shipping container stood near one edge with the new gardens right next to it. The DEPOs all glimmered in the afternoon sunlight, though they were darkened enough so that no one could see the pocket dimension inside.

Floppy charged forward and stopped near the stack of wooden crates, and then his ears twitched as he glared over at me impatiently. His trunk still swung from side to side as he sniffed the air, and he stamped the earth while he waited for us to unhook the cart.

“We need to get him free,” I said and motioned for Fela to start on the left side while I worked on the right. “Then we’ll get into the shipping container and lock it up tight.”

“Why don’t we hide in the bedroom?” the Victorian era woman suggested. “I put some dry food in there just in case we needed it, and you did say that the doors are reinforced.”

“True,” I said with a nervous look towards the screech that came through the massive pines. “But we don’t know what kind of dinos are coming after us. They might be able to break it.”

“Sol said that the doors could survive a bombing,” Raz tilted her head to the side and studied the darkened sliding glass doors.

“I know,” I sighed and finished with the cart.

Floppy jumped free and spun around to look at the forest as if the dinosaurs were about to barge through the trees and attack us. His hooves pawed at the soft grass, and he looked between us like he wanted us to make a decision.

“Alright, alright,” I said. “We’ll trust the doors.”

“You’re trusting Sol,” Emma reminded me and patted me on the shoulder reassuringly. “He wouldn’t lie to us.”

“Will we take the eggs inside with us?” Acrasis asked.

“Yes,” I said. “Each of you take one so that my hands will be free to open the door.”

“They are surprisingly light,” the Victorian era woman said and hefted up one of the massive orbs.

“They are,” I said and led the ladies towards the DEPOs. “I guess we’ll find out how strong these doors are in a few minutes. It sounds like they’re getting closer.”

“How long do we have until the next jump?” the ebony haired woman asked.

“Five hours,” I said with a glance at my watch.

“I have waited longer than that for predators to move on,” Fela said.

“There were things that hunted you?” Raz asked with a look at the sabertooth woman’s claws.

“Not many,” the muscular woman said with a smirk. “But there were packs that would have eaten me if they could. Floppy and I survived them, and we will outlast these creatures.”

I looked over the panel for the DEPO to make sure that it would open into the bedroom. It was designed so that we could reach the pocket dimension from either side of the sliding glass, but the switch had to be in the right direction. I let out a sigh of relief when it worked, and the door revealed the bedroom that Sol had made for us.

The bed had been made and all of our pillows had been added. It reminded me of something from an emperor’s palace instead of a concrete slab room. Even Floppy’s fluffy gray carpet had been moved, and the creature immediately curled up on it with a heavy sigh.

A breeze drifted in from somewhere, and I looked around the well lit room to see that there was a machine along the top of the wall that reminded me of an air conditioner. It puffed out cold air that I hoped was breathable, and made a mental note to read the manual while we waited for Honest Abe to take us to the next world.

“This cave looks very comfortable,” Fela said and gently set her egg down on a stack of blankets. “I believe that it will provide excellent shelter for us.”

“I think it will, too,” I said and glanced over at the sliding glass doors.

I could see clearly into the grassy area of the base, though it was like looking through sunglasses because of the tint. The trees moved in a wind that I couldn’t feel, and the jars jingled in the cart like the ground beneath the cart shook in an earthquake. I could faintly hear the screech of the dinosaurs as they neared, and I tore my gaze away to look at Acrasis.

“Raz, can you feel the dinos through the door?” I asked.

“I can,” the alien woman said and pursed her lips like she was thinking. “They do not seem as big as the triceratops or the long neck ones that came last night.”

“That’s hopeful,” I said. “I doubt that they’re strictly herbivores if they have enough guts to come after us for their eggs.”

The air unit worked overtime to keep the large concrete room cold, and I shiver ran up my spine that had nothing to do with the creatures that hunted us. I turned to look at the four chest of drawers that lined the wall to the left and wondered if there was a sweater that would fit me. They’d probably been packed by Sol’s sycophants, but he would’ve given them all our measurements.

“Do you think this room is soundproof?” Emma asked and held up the NAMBSHUBs. “We could watch that movie you told us about… Jurassic Park.”

“Maybe not the right time for that,” I laughed as I started to open the drawers. “Almost everyone dies in it. And they’re eaten by dinosaurs.”

I left out the part in the second movie where they were hunted down because someone decided to steal a dinosaur egg. That was just a little too close to home, but the jumbo sized eggs were just too big a temptation. I never thought that I’d be that guy, but it wasn’t like I wanted to sell them, and I’d take care of whatever hatched as long as it doesn’t try to eat any of us.

“Ah ha!” I declared in triumph as I pulled out a gray crochet sweater that would fit me.

“Oh,” my Victorian girlfriend said as the screeching echoed through the trees. “Maybe we should wait until we’re not in danger anymore. Just to be safe.”

Emma set the glasses back on the table and then looked at the rest of us to see if we agreed.

“It does sound like an interesting movie,” Fela said. “But I think that I would rather watch it when the predators in it are no longer waiting to devour us.”

“We’ll watch it in the next world,” I promised and strolled back over to the sliding glass doors.

The sun had started its descent, and the trees cast long shadows over our base. It was like the calm before the storm, though I could still hear the faint sound of the creature’s screech. The high pitched sound seemed to come from everywhere, but I couldn’t see anything.

“They have surrounded the camp,” Acrasis said and came to stand next to me. “But they are no longer moving.”

“That sounds a lot like raptors,” I muttered with a frown. “I really don’t want it to be raptors. They’re smart enough that they might figure out a way to get in here. Or at the very least, they might destroy the camp to draw us out.”

“I hope that doesn’t happen,” Emma huffed and stuffed her hands into the pockets of her bustle skirt. “We have all of our water out there. And I just marked where I’d like to put the gardens.”

“And the solar stills,” I added. “Let’s hope that it’s some other dinosaur. Or maybe they’ll be chased off by the triceratops.”

“They do seem to be territorial,” the sabertooth woman said. “They may chase off whatever it is when they come for their meal.”

“Right,” I said and checked my watch. “We’ll hope for that as a backup plan since it’ll be at least another two hours before the sun sets. For now, let’s just stay in here. They shouldn’t be able to see anything through the glass so they won’t know we’re here.”

“They are coming into the camp,” Raz informed us.

I leaned so close to the DEPO that my breath fogged up the glass, and I had to wipe it down so that I could see. The camp still seemed quiet, and I found myself holding my breath like we’d come to the scene in a horror movie that was about to make me jump in my seat.

“There it is,” Fela said and pointed to the stack of wooden crates.

I’m not sure what I was expecting, maybe a raptor with giant teeth, but what strutted out was a terrifying mixture between a cassowary and a lizard. It had the sharp beak of a bird as well as brightly colored feathers that reminded me of blue jays and cardinals. The body ended in a long tail that swept back and forth as it walked, and its feet had the same claws that I’d seen on raptor skeletons.

“I don’t think I’ve ever seen that in one of my books,” Emma whispered with a shiver.

“I think it’s an ornithomimus,” I said and put a hand to the glass so I wouldn’t slam my face into it. “I mean… they always show them looking more like the long necks that we saw last night, but that thing out there is more like a bird than a lizard.”

A shiver of apprehension ran up my spine when two more appeared behind the first, and the three dinosaurs seemed to talk to each other as they spread out around our camp. Their movements were smooth and graceful like an ostrich, and they could probably run just as fast. But unlike an ostrich, they still had arms, though the appendages were short like those on a T-Rex. Feathers covered the arms and trailed along the body towards the tail, and I thought they might be able to fly short distances. They let out the little screeches that we’d heard, and my mouth went dry when one of them looked towards the shipping container.

“I do not like these creatures,” Raz said. “They look like predators.”

“I think they’re omnivores,” I said and glanced over at the sabertooth woman. “So if they find us, they might actually eat us because I doubt they are very picky.”

“Is this what Jurassic Park was like?” the Victorian era woman to my left asked. “Because if it is, then you were right. We shouldn’t be watching it right now.”

“This is exactly what that movie is like,” I said and wrapped an arm around Emma’s thin waist. “But don’t worry. Sol made this pocket dimension, and that means it’s almost impenetrable. You know that paranoid asshole wouldn’t create anything that couldn’t withstand a full government assault.”

“True,” the pale woman said, though her lips pressed together in a worried expression. “They’re just so… awful.”

“They are unpleasant,” Acrasis agreed. “I don’t enjoy the mixture of bird and lizard.”

“It kind of looks like one of the figures that Sol made me,” I admitted. “But that one had been the size of my hand.”

I glanced over at the three giant eggs that sat nearby. They hadn’t started to hatch, but the parents could’ve been out to gather food for when they did. I didn’t know enough about egg hatching to know what all was involved, but at least one of them would probably try to come out soon if the parents had been foraging for them. Hopefully they didn’t come out angry.

“What are they doing?” Emma asked.

“Searching for the eggs,” Fela said and her tail swished behind her. “I do not think that they can smell very well. The bird people had better eyesight than sense of smell. I could always lose them if I blended into my environment.”

“That’s good news,” I said and let out a sigh of relief. “At least we know they won’t be able to find us.”

I watched the creatures prowl around the base, and it was a strangely fascinating sight. Their beaks clacked as they communicated to each other, and their heads swung back and forth to inspect everything. One of them found the cart with the jars of water, and I could see it sniff the air. A moment later, it bent its head down, and then let out an ear-piercing screech.

The other two ran over to investigate, and one of them bent its head down to rub its beak where the eggs had been. It let out a sound like a whimper and then threw its head back and screamed like it had just vowed vengeance. The others joined in, and I covered my ears with my hands to block out the terrible sound.

“They should get back to their other eggs,” my sabertooth girlfriend huffed. “They have other offspring that they should care for. If there are predators nearby, then they should be taking care of the cubs that remain.”

“That would make more sense,” Emma said. “We only took three. There were over twenty there. It’s not as if they don’t have other eggs to watch. And if they went to gather food, then they have even more for the ones that actually hatch.”

“Maybe they will,” Acrasis said. “They might think that whatever took them ate them since there are no eggs to find.”

“Maybe,” I said and glanced over at the shiny shelled orbs. “I wonder if they’re too far along for us to eat.”

“We’ll have to crack them open to find out,” the Victorian woman said and put her hands on her hips. “I managed to sneak a few eggs from the chickens in my world, but I have no idea how to tell if they’re too far gone to eat.”

“We’ll just wait and see,” I said. “With any luck, we’ll end up with at least one new pet.”

“Will it attack us?” the ebony haired woman asked and gave the eggs a dubious look. “I wouldn’t put it past the creatures outside. They look mad enough to tear us to shreds.”

“In the movies they imprinted on whoever they saw first,” I said with a shrug.

Floppy made an irritated sound and rolled his molten brown eyes. His massive head swung over so that his trunk could sniff the eggs, and he patted one of them in approval. He looked at us, huffed, and then put his head back down.

“I believe that one will be okay,” Fela said. “Floppy has a very strong nose.”

“What about the other two?” Raz asked and strolled over to put her hands on the thick shelled orbs. “I do not feel movement from any of them. How does he know?”

“I can not explain it,” the sabertooth woman said and shrugged. “The other two may be viable, but he likes that one.”

“Maybe they’ll be friends,” I said with a smile, and the stare that the miniature woolly mammoth gave me made a laugh bubble out of me.

He looked like he wanted to slap me with his trunk, but he turned his attention to the DEPO behind me, and my blood went cold as his eyes widened. His ears flapped like they did when he was nervous, and he pushed himself to his feet.

I slowly spun on my heel to look at the sliding glass door behind me, and had to cover my mouth to catch the hysterical scream that crawled up my throat at the sight of one of the dinosaurs right outside. My stomach dropped to my ass, and I instinctively took a step back. I motioned for the girls to back up too, and didn’t breath until they were away from the DEPO.

The damned thing pressed the side of its head up to the glass, and its wide bird-like eyes rolled around in the socket like it might be able to see us. It backed up, screeched at its friends, and then slammed its clawed foot into the DEPO in an attempt to break it. The glass shuddered, but it held, and I thanked Sol for his idea to reinforce it.

“How did it figure out where we were?” I huffed and looked around for some form of weapon.

I’d left my assault rifle on the cart, but I did have an old pistol stuck into the back of my pants. It was fully loaded, so at least one of them would go down if they managed to get through. I reached back and pulled it free just as the bird-like dinosaur slammed into the glass again.

“It must’ve heard us,” Fela said. “Or maybe it managed to smell our trail?”

“I really hope that the glass holds,” Emma whispered, and her lightning started to lick her pale fingers.

“So do I,” I said and looked at my watch. “We have four hours until our jump.”

“We can’t leave this world with those things on our base,” the Victorian woman said.

“Definitely not,” I said and wracked my brain for everything that I knew about the ornithomimus.

My Sol had gone on a long tangent about how paleontologists just called everything an ornithomimus. His tirade had ended with four different models of what they looked like, and an entire lesson about how they were more like ostriches than lizards. He’d said that the idiots who did the renderings didn’t know anything, and that they were probably just as mean as the birds they’d created.

The one at the door slammed its taloned leg into the glass again and then pressed its head to the DEPO as if it expected to hear something. The sound must’ve been what had drawn it, and it was sure that it could get to us. It lifted its leg again, but this time it just ran a long claw down the glass to make a screeching sound like nails on a chalkboard.

Fela whimpered and put her hands over her ears. They were pressed all the way back against her auburn hair, and her tail curled around her waist as she squatted down into a ball. She buried her head into Floppy’s fur to muffle it even more, and I pursed my lips together as a plan started to form.

“We can’t stay here,” I said and cocked my pistol. “These things aren’t going anywhere, and we can’t make the jump with them here. Who knows what kind of world we'll end up in, and these demon birds might be the top of the food chain.”

“I cannot think with that sound,” the sabertooth woman hissed and bared her fangs at the DEPO.

“The other two have gone to the other side of the container,” Acrasis said and tilted her head to the side. “They seem to be surrounding us.”

“They probably think that it’s all connected,” I let out a sigh of relief when the giant feathered beast put its foot down. “That can work in our favor. We can open the door, kill the one right outside, and then shut the door before the other two can make it around.”

“I can’t use my Westinghouse powers inside this room,” Emma said and shoved a stray strand of inky black hair behind her ear. “I’ll need to be out in the open or I might hit one of you.”

“Right,” I said and nodded my head. “We’ll kill the first one and then you three make a run for the middle of the base. I have my assault rifle on the water cart, and that’ll stop them in their tracks.”

“What if more come?” Emma asked.

“We’ll cross that bridge when we get to it,” I said and glanced at my watch. “We don’t have that much time before the jump. All we have to do is get them out of the base and hold them off until we can go to the next dimension.”

“I will rip that thing to shreds,” Fela growled, stood up, and then growled at the bird thing on the other side of the glass.

Her tail whipped behind her, and her pupils were the size of saucers as she stared at the creature, all signs she was ready to attack.

“Alright,” I said and snuck closer to the DEPO. “Ready?”

“Let’s do this,” the Victorian woman said and raised her hands.

I took a deep breath as I pulled the gun from my pants, and then I pressed the button to open the DEPO. The massive bird had backed up so that it could charge at the door, and it stumbled when the glass vanished and we stood there instead. I fired off one quick shot before it could gather itself or warn its buddies, though the sound of the pistol would probably draw the other two to our side of the shipping container soon enough.

“Shit, shit, shit,” I muttered as I squeezed out another couple of rounds and then rushed out of our bedroom.

The angry dino-bird finally stumbled and fell to the ground while its blood soaked out into the ground. Its eyes went wide like it couldn’t understand what had just happened, and I felt a pang of sympathy for the thing. The creature’s arms flapped weakly as it tried to get up, but its clawed legs wouldn’t hold the weight of its body.

“I think it’s dead,” Emma declared.

“Then we’d better move,” I replied.

We bolted across the flat ground of the base toward the center as the sun started to set, and the golden rays bathed our camp in light and shadows. The ladies all gathered in the center of the open area, their backs to each other, and their attention on the shipping container. It was like they were Charlie’s Angels, and I was Bosley on my way to grab my assault rifle.

A screech erupted into the air right before one of the giant birds jumped onto the top of the shipping container. It ran across the metal box to the other side and then jumped down. It took a moment, but the dino-bird saw its dead friend crumpled in the dirt, and it whipped its long head around to glower at us as the third one ran around the side.

I stashed my pistol into the back of my pants, grabbed my rifle, and made sure that it was set to automatic so that it would spray the big bastards before they could kill us. They had already started to run towards the girls, and Emma’s blue lightning arced forward, but the damned thing managed to dodge the bolt. I didn’t breathe until the first shots went off, and the bird in the lead went down.

The only one that still stood spun midstep and turned towards me. I squeezed the trigger, but the damned gun jammed, and my heart climbed into my throat as the angry ostrich ancestor barrelled towards me at full speed. It was only a few steps away from me when lightning wrapped around it.

I dodged to the side right as it brought down one of its taloned feet in the spot where I’d been standing. I rolled over as it hissed in disappointment, and I kept rolling until there was more than a few inches between us. As I came to my feet, I knew the assault rifle was useless unless I could clear the jam, but I didn’t think the dino-bird was going to give me that kind of time. As I tossed the rifle aside I noticed that the barrel had been torn into like one of the creatures had scraped its claws down it.

While the creature was focused on me, Fela jumped onto the feathered bastard’s back and wrapped her clawed hands around its neck. Her nails dug deep into the dino’s thick skin, and blood started to trickle down. She held on better than a cowboy in a rodeo as the thing thrashed around and tried to throw her off its back.

I couldn’t get a clear shot and Emma couldn’t use her lightning as long as Fela was hanging on. I tried to signal Fela once I had the gun free, and I saw the female feline glance my way for a moment. Even as the beast started to buck beneath her, the sabertooth woman shifted so that she squatted down on its back. As soon as she pulled her claws from the neck, the head and beak swiveled around to jab at her. But the swift woman had already launched herself into the air, and she landed safely on the ground a short distance away.

“Emma! Now!” I shouted and ran towards Fela.

Blue lightning ripped through the air and found its way into the wounds that my sabertooth girlfriend had created. The dino let out one more screech and then collapsed onto the ground next to its friend. The streaks of energy dissipated, and I looked around to make sure that everyone was okay.

“Holy crap,” I said and stuffed my pistol into the back of my pants. “That went much better than it did in Jurassic Park.”

“Of course,” the Victorian era woman said with a smile. “We’re amazing.”

“I would not like to do that again,” Fela looked out towards the forest and brushed the dirt off of her.

“The other creatures in the area have moved away from the sound of fighting,” Raz informed us.

“Good,” I said and glanced at my watch. “We have two hours before we jump. Let’s get these bastards outside of our camp and clean up. I don’t want to greet the next world covered in dinosaur blood.”

“I’d like to cook one of them,” Emma put her hands on her hips and studied the giant ostrich. “Can we keep the biggest one? I can take care of it after we go to the next world.”

“I would not mind trying one,” the sabertooth woman said. “It only seems fair. Since it tried to kill us.”

“I’m down with that,” I said. “Okay. Floppy and I will get rid of the other two. And Raz, would you mind keeping an eye out to make sure that no one else joins the party?”

“Of course, Dave Meyer,” the alien woman said.

The next two hours went by in the blink of an eye. The ornithomimus were heavy as hell, and I’d ended up covered in even more blood by the time Floppy and I managed to get them outside of our base. I just used the jarred water to wash up, though Emma insisted that she heat up enough for all of us so that we could properly bathe.

We all headed back to the bedroom when it was time to jump since it had worked pretty well as a safe room. I still didn’t like the idea of being stuck in there if the glass somehow broke, but it had held up against a dinosaur attack, so I was pretty sure that it would hold against just about anything else.

My watch started to beep when we were ten seconds from the jump while the light from Honest Abe filled the entire camp, and we waited by the DEPO to see what kind of dimension we would find ourselves in next. The dinosaur world faded away, but a sound came from the area where we'd stashed the eggs, and all of my attention went to the three stolen orbs.

One of them had started to crack.