Cretaceous Sea

raw flesh that lay on the muddy floor smelled. Con questioned the wisdom of eating it, but decided she had little choice. She swallowed only a few bites before she vom-ited.

Con crawled from her den and let the rain wash the foul-ness from her body. It was a gentle rain, though raw. Con was thoroughly chilled before she felt clean enough to put on her shirt. She drank again from a puddle, attempting to cleanse the taste in her mouth with dirty water.

The Tyrannosaur's night visitors had accelerated its ruin-ation. Most of its ribs were exposed, and much its viscera lay half-eaten on the ground. The odor of putrescence filled the dank air. One look, and Con knew the carcass could no longer serve as food or shelter. / won't last long in this rain, she thought drearily. As she stared at her former refuge, Con realized the creature's hide had held back the assault of de-cay. Because that defense had been so thoroughly breached, rot had set in rapidly. Con saw that the waterproof skin might be a resource for her survival. She surveyed the hide for a large area that was still unmarred; then, using the tooth, she began to flay it. The thick hide did not peel away easily. Con found she had to carefully run the tooth between the skin and the body to get it loose. It was hard work that left her covered with blood and rancid grease. Her most trying moment came when she slipped and her leg entered the Tyrannosaur's abdomen up to the knee. The smell that issued forth was almost over-powering.

After much hard work, Con was able to drag a heavy patch of hide from the carcass. Its irregular shape was approxi-mately five feet square. She carried it to the crest of the hill, then stretched it out with the raw side to the ground. With that accomplished, she walked down the hill to the river. She bathed the smell of the carcass from her body and thoroughly washed her clothes. The process chilled her even more, but she dared not smell like the carrion eaters' food. When she thought all the taint was gone, she returned to her den for the tooth, her stone, and the flute.

The nightstalker appeared as she was retrieving her things. It stepped quietly from behind the Tyrannosaur, then froze when it saw Con. I'm supposed to be invisible, she thought. Clearly, she was not. The carnivore stared at her intently with its large yellow-brown eyes. Although it was slimly built and stood less than four feet high, its sharp teeth and wicked claws made it fearsome. The animal appeared to be in its element, with feathers as unruffled by the rain as a duck's. The tragedies that had unfolded upon the world appeared not to have harmed it in the slightest. Rather, they seemed to have provided the nightstalker with abundant opportunities. Con sensed it was trying to determine if she were one of them. Tucking her flute and the tooth into a pocket, Con sur-veyed her shelter wall for a likely rock. She slowly bent over and picked one up. As she did so, she saw the nightstalker's two slashing toe claws rise. Con threw the rock with the quick fluid motion she had acquired pitching varsity baseball. The projectile grazed the dinosaur's chest. It gave a cry and retreated ten yards before turning to stare again at Con. She picked up another rock and threw it. This time was a near miss. The nightstalker did not retreat, but it did not advance either. Con sensed a delicate truce. With a wary eye on the nightstalker, she quickly removed her shirt to use for carrying stones. She spread it on the ground and piled all the rocks that were suitable for throwing upon it. When she was done, she gathered up her bundle and retreated slowly, never taking her eye from the creature that stared back. As Con retreated, the nightstalker advanced until it reached the Tyrannosaur. It stopped there and began to feed.

Con circled around to the hilltop. She rolled up the hide, slung it over her shoulder, then picked up her bundle of stones with her spare hand. Spying another hill about a mile down the river, she headed for it. Between the hills was a small stream that was not too swollen to cross. She unrolled the hide and began to scrape it with the tooth and scour it with mud. Every once in a while, she rinsed it off in the running water and sniffed it. She repeated the process several times before she was satisfied its scent was unlikely to attract nightstalkers. She bathed one last time before heading to the next hill. By the time Con climbed to the hilltop, she was thoroughly cold and exhausted. Cutting, cleaning, and carrying the heavy hide and the repeated bathing had cost her dearly in terms of warmth and energy. Her stomach cramps had returned, and there was nothing to sate them. 'Perhaps it was all for nothing,' she said tiredly. She emptied her shirt of rocks and put it on. Then she dug a small circular trench to drain off the rain and a basin to catch it. She arranged her possessions within the circle—the pile of rocks, the cobblestone, the tooth, and the flute—then sat down among them and wrapped herself in the hide. She suddenly thought of the shoe she had left behind. 'I won't need it.' She lifted the flute to her lips and blew three short notes, paused and blew one long one. This would be her song. She intended to stay upon the hill and play it until dark. If she survived the night, she would play it the next day. Con knew she was capable of nothing more. Those four notes would be her last cries for help and, perhaps, her dirge. RICK AND JOE began to walk the riverbank as soon as there was light to see. Although it was springtime in the northern hemisphere, the darkened 'days' were short be-cause the sun's light could penetrate the atmosphere only when it was high in the sky. They walked in a nether world where everything was a dimly seen shadow. Each rock, each corpse by the river revealed its true nature only when they approached closely. This dreary world did not lend itself to conversation, and they seldom spoke.

They spied a pale shape in the water and waded out to investigate. It was a small Hypsilophodontid. Its hide had been abraded, leaving only bloodless flesh. When they returned to the shore, Joe said, 'Oh God, that was hor-rible. For a moment I thought...'

'Me too,' said Rick, not wanting to hear the end of Joe's sentence.

'How far do you think we should search?'

'I haven't a clue,' said Rick. 'I've no experience in such matters. It's hard to tell how far we've gone.'

'Hell,' said Joe, 'I've even lost track of the days, if you can call...'

'Shhhh!' said Rick urgently. 'I hear something.'

Joe listened. 'I hear it, too. Just barely. Is it a bird?'

'I don't think so,' said Rick. 'It's too regular, and there's only one note.'

'Three short... one long ... three short... one long ... three ... Con's signaling us!' cried Joe. 'It's got be her!'

'CON!' yelled Rick at the top of his lungs.