The roar echoed through the trees long after it had ceased, a primal thunder that vibrated in the bones. For a moment, the group sat frozen around the fire, their laughter strangled mid-breath. The jungle fell silent, save for the crackle of torches and the faint lap of waves.Victor Kade smiled, raising his glass of rum as though nothing unusual had happened. “Ah,” he said softly, almost reverently. “So they’ve come to greet you.”
“They?” Claire’s voice wavered despite her attempt at nonchalance. She raised her camera, trying to peer into the dark. “What do you mean, they?”
Victor’s grin widened. “You’ll see. Tomorrow, all will be revealed. Tonight, relax.”
But no one relaxed. Even Marcus, who had faced anti-aircraft fire in war, found his bravado slipping. “That wasn’t a jaguar, was it?” he asked.
Dr. Ortega shook his head vigorously. “No mammal makes that sound. That was… deeper. Resonant. Like… like—”
“Don’t say it,” Eliza snapped. She didn’t want to hear it spoken aloud, not yet.
The tension lingered through the night. Sleep came only in fragments, punctuated by distant rustles and the occasional snap of a branch heavy with something large. Daniel took the first watch, eyes scanning the tree line with soldierly patience.
At dawn, Victor led them inland. The jungle was alive with colour and noise—parrots flashing scarlet, insects humming, orchids blooming from tree trunks. Ortega gushed over every plant, stuffing samples into his satchel. But Eliza’s focus stayed on the ground. She saw impressions in the soil—three-toed tracks, massive in size, pressed fresh into the earth.
She slowed, her fingers brushing the edges of one print. “Victor,” she called. “What left this?”
Victor only winked. “The past,” he said cryptically, and continued walking.
The path ended at a ridge overlooking a vast clearing. Mist curled above a river valley where towering ferns swayed like green cathedrals. And there, grazing calmly on the banks, were creatures Eliza knew only from museum halls.
Sauropods.
Their necks stretched high into the canopy, pulling leaves from trees with slow, sweeping motions. Their tails dragged thick furrows in the soil. The ground seemed to vibrate with their every step.
Eliza’s breath caught. Her knees nearly gave out. She was staring at living fossils—beings that had ruled Earth long before humans even dreamed of fire.
Claire’s camera whirred as she filmed feverishly, whispering, “My God… my God…”
“Welcome,” Victor announced proudly, spreading his arms wide, “to a world lost to time. To my private Eden.”
For a long, reverent moment, no one spoke. Even Daniel, the soldier, was transfixed by the spectacle.
Then, from the far side of the valley, the foliage erupted. A blur of motion, low and fast, burst from the undergrowth.
The sauropods trumpeted in alarm, their massive bodies swaying as panic rippled through the herd.
And out of the trees came hunters—sleek, scaled, and lethal.
Eliza whispered the word she had tried not to say the night before.
“Raptors.”
Source: Some or all of the content was generated using an AI language model
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