ch 72 Dinosaur Gauntlet 2

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The next morning Carl finished his practice and got to his feet, stretching every which way. The feeling of stretching his spine and tail out felt great, and he was feeling energetic and ready for the day.

Looking around to get his bearings, Carl departed to the east, towards where he saw plenty of forest that looked like it would avoid the fire from the previous day. The morning sun shone through the trees, making a nice dappled effect of the shadows.

Now that Carl was preparing to hunt, he started paying more attention to looking for tracks and sign in his surroundings. Everywhere he looked he could see many of the traces of the panicked flight the other dinos had done the previous day, but he wasn't seeing any tracks or signs that any of them had wandered back.

Sniffing the air, Carl was amazed at just how good his sense of smell was. It was multiple times better than even when he was in his shadow panther form. His eyesight was also amazing. Carl was very pleased with the basic physique that the T-Rex had.

As he was traveling through the forest, Carl had an interesting thought. Focusing for a moment while looking at his tail, he was able to change the colors on his tail. Giving a little dino smirk, he hunkered down in some shrubbery and focused on changing his coloration. He soon blended in to his surroundings.

'Oh man, I'm so glad that I picked up Metamorphmagus!' Carl chuffed a bit in amusement and excitement. It was one more skill that would make him a much better hunter.

Carl got up out of the shrubbery he was hiding in and continued on. After some time, he started smelling water as well as some animals ahead of him. Peering through the trees, Carl could see a break in the trees where a clearing was some distance ahead.

After testing the wind, Carl circled around a bit to make sure that the wind wouldn't pass his scent to whatever was in the clearing. Paying attention to his footing, coloration, and cover, Carl crept closer to whatever his nose was picking up.

Peering out from behind cover, Carl saw a herd of 30 or so dinosaurs. Searching his memory, Carl remembered from books he read that they seemed to be Leptoceratops. The adults were about 6.5 feet long, from snout to tail tip.

Carl observed the group for some time, to see their behavior. Some of the herd would remain standing, staying alert for predators, while the rest of the group was leaning down and eating some of the green grasses in the clearing.

They seemed to be distantly related to the Triceratops, or at least had some features in common. First off, the Leptoceratops had a beak and a small bony fringe on the back of their head. But aside from that, they were very different. They didn't have the size or horns of their more famous cousins. They also had spines running down their tail starting at their hips. And most importantly, they alternated between standing on two legs and crawling around on four while they grazed.

Looking around, Carl didn't see any other predators around, and the behavior of the Leptoceratops seemed to indicate that they didn't sense any problems around them for now.

Carl considered them as his first hunt for some time. At the moment, he was barely as tall when standing as the adult Leptoceratops were at the hips, only about 2.5 feet. So he was vastly outweighed and undersized.

But on the other hand, he had already attained the first stage of the Great Way of the Buddha which should have given him the strength to lift nearly 2 tons. But that was with a human body, and he was much smaller than a human body at the moment, so he wasn't sure just how that strength would translate to this body.

Considering the matter, Carl set his eyes on one of the juvenile Leptoceratops. He would attempt to hunt one of the medium sized ones for now, until he got stronger and more confident in his hunting abilities.

So he began creeping closer, moving from cover to cover. Relying more on his sense of smell than sight to tell when he was getting close as he crept through the grass kept to the depressions in the ground while keeping his camouflage up.

Carl saw that he was close, within 10 feet of his prey. All his muscles tensed for the push off. Carl pounced! The Leptoceratops herd was startled and began running, but Carl dashed forward incredibly fast for his size and within 20 feet had pounced on the prey he had an eye on.

He landed on its back with his jaws missing the back of the neck he was aiming for, but getting a good hold on the spine his prey. He clamped down with his jaws, surprised at how easily his teeth sank into the flesh of the herbivore under him. His increased strength apparently gave a huge boost to his jaw strength.

Carl used his back feet to claw at the Leptoceratops belly while hanging from his back. He could feel his claws sinking in and the blood was flowing.

With a pitiful cry, the prey fell to the ground under Carl's assault.

With the creature now unable to flee, Carl repositioned himself, and clamped his jaws onto the animal's throat, biting down as hard as he could. His jaw sank in, crushing the esophagus as well as cutting off the blood supply to the brain. The animal died shortly after.

Carl had already had experience hunting in his shadow panther form, so he wasn't as shocked by the bloody experience as he might have been before. In addition, his predator instincts were crowing in delight while his tongue transmitted the delicious taste to his brain.

Standing up and looking around, Carl didn't see the herd of Leptoceratops anymore. They had made their getaway. He also didn't sense any other predator nearby, but he didn't want to take any chances. Clamping his jaws on his prey, Carl dragged it back to the trees where he could anchor a good notice me not around to keep other animals from approaching while he fed.

Soon Carl began enjoying the meal. Something about having made the hunt and kill himself always excited him, making the meal that much more delicious.

Once he was full, Carl continued practicing his Ki technique to continue training up his physique and strength.

While doing so, he kept one earhole open for any intruders that might give him a hard time. Just like that, Carl set the tone for his following days, as he fell into a routine of practicing and hunting. He never felt bored, even if all he did was sit in one spot looking around for anything to hunt. At the very least, he always had his sense of smell to tell him things about his surroundings, which was oddly entertaining.

The next morning when the sun shone, Carl finished up his practice ravenously hungry, and continued eating the remains of his kill. He was still flabbergasted a bit at how huge his appetite was as he was practicing the body enhancement technique. He hadn't run into this problem when he was practicing the technique as a human. At most, he was just a bit hungrier when he was training in the HSDK world, nothing like this.

'I guess the difference in body really does make a difference. Here I'm in a beast's body, so I have to have a beast's consideration for the differences. A bigger stomach, for one.' After a moment's considerations, Carl thought of something else. 'Or it's because I'm just hatched and in a growth state. Or both. I wonder if it will affect my innate strength, by having a beast's lineage.'

After a bit, Carl shook those ideas out of his head. They weren't important at the moment. What was important was going on another hunt to catch food. Looking down at the scraps of a 200 pound animal that he devoured in one day, Carl shook his head at just how big his appetite was. Even now he wasn't completely sated.

But looking at his body, he had grown another few inches long overnight. At the rate he was eating and growing, he would probably only take a couple years to reach his full growth, instead of 15-20 years.

'With a human body size, the strength inherent in the first stage is 2 tons. But what about comparing that with a full sized T-Rex body? Just how strong would it be?' Carl laughed, his baby T-Rex barking echoing around the trees.

After chortling for a bit, Carl blanked his mind of any of his concerns, ideas, and worries and continued his explorations of the area. It was important while moving to be especially alert. Even if his perk driven senses should warn him of any predators targeting or ambushing him, that was no excuse to be lazy.

He briefly considered following the tracks of the Leptroceratops from the previous day and grabbing another, but then thought he shouldn't deplete their numbers too greatly. He didn't want to eat any animal to extinction just to fill his belly.

And if he couldn't find any prey for his meal today, at most, he would pause his Ki practice for a day so he wouldn't starve himself to death with his body's hunger demands.

With that resolution, Carl began traveling east once more, climbing a nearby ridge so he could get eyes on the layout of the land.

Carl found that his body was very agile as he ran through the large and widely spaced trees. It felt fun, dashing around on his two legs, his smaller forearms tucked into his chest. With his diminutive size at the current time, he didn't feel like a mighty T-Rex. He didn't even feel like the Utahraptors. He felt more like those little compys from the Jurassic Park movie. Just a little guy with a big bite!

Carl practically flew over the terrain as he climbed the ridge, and then climbed a thick tree. That was one thing he wouldn't be able to keep doing as he got older.

Reaching the height where the branches couldn't continue supporting his weight, Carl pushed aside the smaller branches obscuring his sight.

The beautiful early morning landscape in front of him was beautiful. There were great swaths of forest around. In the distance, Carl could see where the forest ended and grasslands began.

It was only now that Carl realized that the flora in this lost world seemed to be full of primitive plantlife that the dinosaurs lived with, not the modern day world's plantlife. It seemed to be a bit more robust to accommodate the needs of the gigantic herbivores that roamed the area.

In the distant grasslands, Carl could make out various herds of those large herbivores. He could see Triceratops, Appotosaurus, Stegasaurus, Anklyosaurus, and many other smaller creatures.

Carl realized that since he was in the modern time, not the Cretaceous period that the T-Rex originally lived, that there were dinosaurs from all the periods seemingly living here side by side.

'What a wonderful lost land!' Carl happily thought. Seeing the sheer size of the area where the dinosaurs lived in, Carl was especially happy. It seems that there would be plenty for him to eat in the coming days that he shouldn't need to hold back his appetite too much.

Scrambling down the tree, Carl had just reached the base when he felt a cold sensation on his neck, and a feeling of danger. Focusing on his senses, especially his sense of smell, he focused in on where the sensation was coming from.

Over 30 feet away, he spotted the cold eyes of a Velociraptor eyeing him. Carl chuckled inside, since the little beastie was only about the same size as he was. He felt no real danger from it, despite its obvious intentions.

Carl then saw several more show up. Despite Carl obviously spotting them, they continued acting as if they were hunting him. The group split up, trying to cut off Carl's escape route.

'Well, just when I was thinking of hunting, brunch delivers itself.' Carl chuckled inside.

Casually walking away from the approaching raptors, Carl employed his metamorphmagus abilities when he arrived at a clump of shrubbery. He changed directions and set up his own ambush among some rocks while blending in to the surroundings.

Carl then watched from his chosen perch as the raptors lost sight of him and became confused. The pack of 15 or so converged on the last known spot that they had seen him, milling around as they tried to determine where he had gone.

That was the moment Carl had been waiting for. With a mighty roar, that came out more like a pitiful 'waaaaaang!', Carl pounced on the group. Despite the pitiful sound that he made, his roar was a use of the Mighty Roar perk, so it temporarily stunned the group of raptors.

Carl was on them before they could recover, and slashed two necks with his hind claws as he came down in the midst of them. Blood fountained out of the deep slashes he made. The two raptors he injured collapsed under the attack, and Carl clamped down on them, one with his jaws, the other with his small arms.

The rest of the pack freaked out at the sudden attack and quick death; the moment they recovered from the panic, they scattered in all directions. Carl let them go. He had taught them a lesson to fear him, and secured another meal, which was exactly what he wanted.

The weak struggles the prey under his claws and teeth didn't last long as they quickly bled out. Giving the equivalent of a proud T-Rex smirk, Carl set up another notice me not charm and began practicing his body cultivation technique. His catch would fill his belly when he finished practicing.

It had been a couple weeks since the meteor impact disaster, and Carl had continued his routine of training and hunting. He had wandered by the sections of the forest that were burnt due to the fires from the meteor impacts, and had already seen new plant growth in the previously burnt areas already sprouting up. It probably helped that there was plenty of moisture in the air and rain on a regular basis that ensured the plants were able to grow so quickly.

Carl was pretty happy that even before he began practicing his body cultivation, he hadn't been bothered by the high humidity. He remembered being quite miserable in his original life when he'd been forced to endure the humid climates. But now with his dinosaur body, he actually loved the climate.

Besides hunting for food every day, Carl had made it a practice to nibble on the various plants he came across. He knew that the act of eating them would add them to his Hunting/Grazing Grounds, even though he wouldn't be able to access the grounds until he left the Gauntlet world and regained access to his Warehouse.

'Right, that reminds me. What about my various Monopoly properties? Are they present in this world? I can't find out because I can't access my Warehouse to interact with my VIs. And just because I can't access my Warehouse, does that mean that if my properties are present in the world, then they aren't getting the supplies from my farms?'

Carl sighed in defeat. He really had no way to figured out the answers to those questions at the moment. And worrying about them wouldn't help him at all. So he made an effort to throw the problem to the back of his mind. Especially because even if his business wasn't going so good at the moment, it wasn't like he would lose the properties. In a new world, his business would resume like normal.

Chances were that his managing VIs were working to find an alternate supply source, if they haven't already secured some.

Carl then returned his attention to the matter in front of him, namely the giant lake he was currently looking at in curiosity.

When he had first looked at the large lake, Carl had almost dismissed it and continued on his way. It wasn't until he noticed a brief turbulence beneath the lake that Carl had looked closer. At which point, Carl had seen some giant water dwelling dinosaur gliding just under the surface.

With that, Carl's attention was captured. He gazed interestedly at the lake. Only then was he really cognizant of what his senses had already known. The giant lake was salt water. It even smelled like an ocean.

How was it possible to have a giant lake be a small sea in the middle of a continent?

Carl's gaze at the depths of the lake gave him no answer, other than the lake was incredibly deep. Even with his enhanced sight he couldn't see the lake bed.

Was it connected to the ocean with underwater caverns? Was it just salty like the Great Salt Lake in Utah?

Carl was itching to find out. With his water mastery and bubble head charm, exploring the depths should be easy for him. But looking at the enormous predators in the water, Carl decided to wait until he had grown more and was large enough that he wouldn't be swallowed so easily. He didn't fancy playing Jonah and the whale. Digging himself out of a carcass at the bottom of the ocean didn't sound like fun.

He wasn't really afraid of them, but he figured they would be annoying if they kept interrupting his exploration. When he was fully grown, his sheer size would deter them from interrupting him. So, exploring the depths could wait for now.

Carl then turned his attention back to his surroundings. Around the great sea lake, there was a large marshy grasslands, in which roamed herds of various herbivores. Carl had been skirting around those very herds for the past day as he traveled.

Occasionally he would have fun with the herds of herbivores, jumping on the backs of the large dinosaurs and catching a ride while trying to keep his balance. He knew he wouldn't be able to get away with being so casual and having fun when he grew bigger. Then he would be an actual dangerous predator to these giant cows, and they would freak out about his presence.

So he took the opportunity now to play around with them before moving on as he continued to wander around his lost land.

Now that Carl decided to ignore the inland ocean lake, he turned away and started making his way across the grasslands to the other side, where Carl could see hilly and valley terrain. He was curious to see what food there was on offer there. And he had seen some Pterodactyls flying around there, making their way from the hills to the lake.

A basket full of wings sounded good about now. He was curious about the flavor…

The sound of Pterodactyl calls echoed over the cliffs. Small Pterodactyls that couldn't fly yet remained in their nests on the cliff face, while their parents were making trips back and forth from the cliff face to the inland sea lake.

Carl was perched on a rock some distance from the cliff face, color shifted to look like just another projection of the rock he was perched on. He was dubiously looking at the cliff face, doubting his original plan.

Over the past few weeks he had been daily hunting and training, which caused his growth to be incredibly fast. As a result, he was now nearly four feet tall at the hip, and nearly eight feet long.

Looking at the sheer cliff face, taking into consideration his increased size, and adding in the presence of flight predators, Carl wasn't quite so confident of his idea to raid the Pterodactyl nests as he originally was.

He could still save himself if he fell with cushion charms. But he wasn't sure he wanted to go through the hassle until he could fly on his own to make sure he didn't run into any problems.

Having just made up his mind to come back later for some "chicken wings" and eggs, Carl was surprised to hear something he didn't expect to hear.

The loud thrumming sound of rotors were echoing over the cliffs. Many helicopters suddenly appeared from beyond the mountains, flying past the nests of the Pterodactyls.

The Pterodactyls actually freaked out quite a lot, taking to the air. There were quite a bit of near misses as the helicopters barely avoided crashing due to the presence of the dinosaurs.

Carl chuckled a bit to see the frantic maneuvers of the pilots to keep from the disaster of crashing into the dinosaurs or each other. After they got escaped from the near disaster, the helicopters reformed into their formation and continued on their way.

Looking at the formation of heavy duty helicopters, which were apparently the quickest and easiest way into the lost land of the dinosaurs, Carl wondered what their purpose was. Were they here just for a safari hunt? Or were they going to capture eggs and baby dinosaur specimen to bring back to their zoos and labs?

Carl abandoned his perch and followed behind the helicopters.

He was amused to discover that at the sight of the helicopters Carl's dinosaur instincts made him feel very territorial. He had already started considering that the land of dinosaurs here was his. To see these humans come here and trespass on his land offended him. Especially if they were here to capture and steal his prey.

On the other hand, Carl wasn't going to make the assumption that they were here to plunder resources. They might be here to do scientific studies and observation only…

Carl cracked up laughing inside. Yeah, he didn't believe it either. The kind of people who simply want to study animals, even rare extinct animals, for science usually couldn't afford the cost of performing those studies. They usually needed a financial backer. And those who had the money usually weren't philanthropist enough to fund such studies unless they got some sort of return on their money.

At the very least a rich person needed to recoup costs, or they wouldn't be able to keep funding scientific studies in the future. And no one liked the idea of being duped out of their money or property to fund a fool who talked big but wasted their investment while getting no results.

So Carl was pretty sure this group of people was here to grab samples that would be used to make a profit.

And while Carl didn't really have a problem with the idea of people profiting off their ventures in general, he wanted to supervise the people doing the profiting. He wasn't about to let large groups of people in to use the natural resources until they had slashed and burned everything to the ground in their greed to profit.

This was his home and hunting grounds, after all.

So while the helicopters made their way to their chosen landing site, Carl followed behind them, trying to keep them in sight. Which was surprisingly easy, since he could run very quickly now, with his body strength from training.

A short time later, Carl found the group had set down on the grasslands. Carl crouched in the grass on a nearby hill, watching the group set up a perimeter and camp. They had chosen to set up near one of the rivers that ran into the lake, where they could gather water to be purified for their daily use.

It made sense for them to rely on a local source of water. Water was heavy, sloshed around, and was not compressible. They had weight to fuel ratios to consider, so they would naturally try to travel as light as possible.

Carl watched in amusement as they set up their little electrical fence perimeter, powered by generators. Based on what he had seen already of the large dinosaurs, they wouldn't be bothered by such a little shock. Even the predators wouldn't be deterred by it very much. At most they would be a little more careful in their attempts to circumvent the fence.

Meanwhile Carl listened in to the conversations he could hear from his hill a couple hundred meters away from the camp. Most of the time Carl suppressed his conscious attention to his senses so he didn't get overwhelmed by the sheer amount of useless input. But now that Carl was focusing, he could clearly hear the conversations going on.

When Carl heard they had a satellite link back to their people, he was suddenly very interested. He knew that there was supposed to be "modern humans" in this world. But that could cover a lot of ground. Hell, by the sense of geological time, anything from 5000 B.C. - 5000 A.D. could easily be considered "modern".

So seeing this group of humans coming in on helicopters, sporting guns and having computer tech, made Carl aware of the approximate timeline of just when he was, based on their equipment.

And he was quite interested in getting a satellite phone that would link him back to the human's home so he could peruse the internet for more information.

After a few hours of listening in on their conversation, Carl knew for sure that the group of humans were setting up camp here to gather some samples to take back to someone named Whippleton.

With his initial curiosity sated, he didn't hang about anymore and departed as silently and invisibly as he had arrived. He still had to get some dinner…

Barnes had just exited his tent where he had his computer set up, having just sent a situation report back to Whippleton, when he saw Sheffield standing nearby, staring out at the perimeter.

"See anything?" Barnes nervously asked as he walked up next to Sheffield. He knew how to handle all kinds of situations among human civilization. He could talk his way out of anything; from a woman being offended by his checking her out, to talking rings around the local authorities and getting released from smuggling charges.

But out here in the wild Barnes knew his skills were redundant and useless. He didn't really know what to expect and felt like danger was all around him, which made him especially jumpy.

Hell, his fears weren't even unjustified! He had seen plenty of satellite footage over the past month that showed there were plenty of predators here that would love to kill and eat him.

There was even that short video of what looked like a mini T-Rex efficiently taking down a dinosaur that was four times bigger than him. That had been especially spine tingling. That dinosaur that was so much bigger than the mini T-Rex had gone down in a matter of seconds. He wouldn't last any longer, considering he was much smaller.

So even though he didn't see any dinosaurs right now, that didn't give him any assurances. That mini T-Rex had come out of nowhere. Even with careful analysis of the footage going frame by frame they didn't see any sign of the T-Rex before he made his lunge at his prey.

"No." Sheffield stated curtly, startling Barnes who had almost forgotten he was waiting for an answer. "And that's what bothers me." His eyes continued to scan the grasslands outside the perimeter they had made. "Something was watching us until just a moment ago, and I never caught sight of it. I could feel its eyes on us, though."

Barnes shivered at the idea that they were being eyed by some predators, but reassured himself that they were fine behind their perimeter.

"And don't think that the puny perimeter will mean all that much to some of these dinos. It's really only a slight deterrent. Even a bunch of enraged elephants could knock it down, let alone these behemoths." Sheffield casually commented while eyeing Barnes, and was pleased to see the man shiver in fear once more. He never liked Barnes, so seeing the man so jumpy was a special treat.

"Well, it's a good thing that there is a huge incentive for you to get your job done quick and get out of here, then, yeah?" Barnes roughly commented, having seen the ridicule in the other mans eyes and trying to get some measure of his own back. "Be sure you don't fail, or your bonus will disappear like that." Barnes said with a snap of his fingers.

Sheffield took care to shrug nonchalantly, unwilling to let the man see his own unease. He had felt the gaze of a predator on him from the moment they landed and started setting up camp. The fact that he could feel that gaze and hadn't been able to spot anything, even when the creature had been leaving, really unnerved him.

If it came again at night, his infrared and night scopes should be able to spot what they were dealing with. At least it was gone for now…

"Yeah. Let's get this job done." Sheffield whispered as he took one last lingering gaze on his surroundings.

Later that night Carl made another trip to the human's camp. Looking over the state of the camp, he was satisfied that most of the humans were asleep. There were a few that were awake that were on night watch, but they shouldn't be able to catch sight of him.

Before making his move to infiltrate the camp, Carl cast the usual stealth spells on himself. Sight, scent, and sound were the basic three. But since Carl knew about human tech, he added another one to mask his heat signature and make it blend into his surroundings.

Even with his stealth spells in place, Carl still practiced his skills of stealth. He crept silently up to the wire perimeter fence, and easily leapt over it. Landing silently on the ground inside the camp, Carl was happy he didn't set off any motion detectors. He made his way further inside the camp, sniffing and looking curiously at what they had set up.

Carl looked over their light weight off road vehicles that they planned to use to get around and collect their samples the next day.

Inside one of the tents they had a multitude of different firearms and tranquilizer darts stacked up.

He was also amused by the placement of the infrared cameras that focused on the perimeter. Those cameras might see the presence of other predators, but not him.

Making his way around the sleeping areas, Carl did a little poking in the sleeping brains of the leaders of the expedition to see what their goals were. Since they were only planning on taking a few eggs, Carl wasn't particularly bothered at first. He was fine with them taking a small portion of the prey. He wasn't a selfish predator that didn't want anyone else to have anything. As long as they didn't go overboard.

He was actually more curious about just what they planned to do with the eggs that they did gather. But since they didn't know what their employer was planning, he couldn't find the answer himself.

His curiosity sated for the time being, Carl was about to leave the camp, when he realized something. His predator's instincts seemed to be affecting him greatly in this new body, since he was about to just let this group of humans do what they want with no care, as long as they didn't cross his bottom line.

Carl realizedhe had been thinking of them like they were scavengers that nibbled on the scraps left from his hunt, which were of no great importance to a predator. That it was too much of a hassle to chase them from the area of his kill since they only took a few scraps.

Now that Carl realized his thinking was being greatly affected by his instincts, he could take steps to overcome the hormone driven mood and mindset.

And he realized he was about to make a big mistake by leaving the humans alone.

While a single group of humans taking a few eggs wouldn't hurt the prey population, there were more far reaching consequences to letting them carry out their plans.

Sure, one single group of humans benefitting a bit from his lost land wouldn't damage the Lost Land too much. But when news about how they had brought something valuable back got around, and news like that always made the rounds, and other groups saw how profitable it was, they too would try to get in on the action.

It would trigger a sort of gold rush mentality/activity; where everyone and their mother would try to get in on the action before it was gone.

And having hordes of humans coming to strip the place clean would piss Carl off something fierce.

Carl shook his head at his animal instincts getting in the way. He already knew this. But he still almost fell into a trap and didn't consider the consequences.

So it was better to not let this group of humans get away with anything so as to avoid drawing in more groups to his land.

With that idea settled, Carl made his way back into the camp. He had some equipment to sabotage. If the equipment the group needed for their hunt was damaged, then there would be no hunt. That was as much of a warning as he would give them.

If the group didn't understand the statement that Carl was making, or stubbornly ignored it, then he might have to get a little more forceful in teaching them the lesson.

After finishing his work with the human's equipment, he left the camp with a graceful leap over the fence. He settled down with a smirk nearby to relax the rest of the night away. His normal daily practice could be delayed until this issue was taken care of.

Sheffield's second in command woke him up early in the morning, babbling about sabotage. It was unusual to see Manny so freaked out, that it got Sheffield up in a hurry. Only taking enough time to make sure he was dressed and armed, Sheffield followed Manny to see what damage had been done.

"It's uncanny boss. All of our Rhinos had their tires slashed and the fuel tank pierced, draining the gas. There's no way to repair all four tires and repair the tanks on every Rhino. They're trashed." Manny babbled as Sheffield inspected the damage.

Sheffield was scowling at the ruin of his scheduled plans. Looking around at all his men, he couldn't see anything suspicious in their expressions or behavior to indicate any of them were responsible for the damage. He wouldn't put it past rival companies to pay off a traitor to do such delaying tactics.

While they foundered, the rival companies were no doubt throwing together their own expedition.

And while he didn't like the thought of any of his men turning traitor like this, there was still the small group of men under Barnes that he hadn't been allowed to veto coming. It was likely one of them who did it. Bastards!

Sheffield looked at the damage once more. Whoever sabotaged them did a good job of making it look like it was something one of the local dinos had done, instead of being the work of a human traitor in their midst.

He idly wondered what tools the saboteur had used to make it look like the tires and tanks had been gnawed at with teeth and slashed with claws, not punctured by tools.

The damage was just too great to use the equipment. Even the spare tires had all been trashed, and the welding equipment's hoses had all been cut. There was no fixing it.

"This makes our mission more difficult, but not impossible." Sheffield announced to his men. "We deliberately staged here because it was a distance from any of the nests, so we wouldn't be stirring up trouble for ourselves. But now, we'll have to adjust a bit. Now that we don't have to transport a bunch of heavy equipment, we have some spare fuel, so we'll use a couple helicopters to get close to the nests, and go the rest of the way on foot."

"Remember, if we go back empty handed, this whole expedition will be a loss. So keep an eye out for anybody that isn't acting in the best interest of everyone here."

He knew everyone was thinking that one of them was a traitor that just made their life more difficult, but he couldn't say it or he would have to take more extreme measures. And that would take time he didn't have to spare. They needed to get this done quick.

Sheffield finished giving Manny orders on what to prepare for their expedition and how to prevent any more sabotage. The men loyal to him would keep a better eye out and prevent the saboteur from striking again. But if they caught the man who did this, he would make him pay.

Oh yes, he would make the man pay who tried to keep him from this paycheck.