Eric Flint - Time spike

"It'll be okay," she said. "It'll be okay. Just take it easy." Joe thought about telling her to close her eyes the next time she lied, but was hit with another wave of pain and dizziness. When the wave peaked, he passed out. He came to sometime later. At first he was confused by his whereabouts. Then he realized he was lying inside a cave, covered with a shirt that had been warmed somehow. They must have made it to the cave, carrying him all the way. Joe thought about crawling to the entrance, but knew he didn't have it in him. It took everything he had just to breathe. He brought his hand up to feel his chest. It had been wrapped. That surprised him. He knew they didn't wrap broken ribs any more. They said it could cause pneumonia. But maybe the monster's claws had cut him. Feeling his body preparing to cough again, he instinctively braced himself for the pain. The cough was pathetic sounding, no more than a whisper, but the pain from it caused him to moan. "You're awake," Lylah Caldwell said. She entered the cave on one hand and two knees. The other hand held a small bowl of steaming liquid. "You wrapped me," he whispered. "Why?" "I had to.

You didn't just crack your ribs. I'm sure at least one of them was snapped loose. I didn't want it to do any more damage than it already had. A couple of the women who had blouses donated their T-shirts for material." She held the bowl to his mouth and he took a sip. It was some kind of meat broth. It tasted wonderful. Lylah smiled crookedly.

"It's bear soup." The smile went away. "I would normally tell you to breathe deeply and do plenty of deep coughing. But I don't think that's the way we need to go with this." She offered him another sip.

"No more. Man, that hurts." "I know. But, hurt or not, you have to drink a little. It's good for you. Besides, you can think of it as revenge." She put the bowl back to his lips, tipping it, forcing him to swallow or wear it. Three painful sips later she pulled it away, allowing him to rest. "We made it out of whatever that thing was that jumped you. Marie showed us how to skin it and use the brain to tan the hide. She has people working on making a sort of moccasin for our feet." Joe's head still felt muzzy. "How long have I been out?"

"Almost two days, off and on. You came back to consciousness a few times, but you probably don't remember." Out for two days. That was… scary. More to take his mind off his fear than any real curiosity, he tapped the plastic bowl she'd use to feed him. It was odd-looking. "What's this?" "Karen's on her monthly. It's her pad-case. She had it in her pocket." That made him laugh, unfortunately. The pain made him stop. He wondered what they were using to heat the soup in, but was afraid to ask. Another burst of laughter might kill him. Or, worse yet, make him just wish he were dead. He was too tired, anyway. He drifted off to sleep seconds later.

Marie dropped another thin twig onto the small blaze. She had been feeding the fire since sundown, one stick at a time, even though she wasn't sure making a fire was the right thing to do. The fire might be spotted by cons out looking for them. But Marie didn't think that was likely. The fire wasn't that big, after all. They were well into the wilderness here, and if you didn't know the route to the cave it would be like finding the proverbial needle in a haystack. For the sort of men likely to be prisoners in a maximum security prison, anyway. There might be a mountain man type among them, but she doubted it.

Alexander's inmates had come from all over the state. Most of them had been residents of Chicago or one of the state's other cities. She figured they weren't going to leave the security of the prison's walls to wander miles into a wilderness filled with wild animals up to and including dinosaurs. Not even looking for women. And for all they knew, by now the escaped guards had hooked back up with Andy Blacklock and his people, who were well armed. No, it was the dinosaurs she was worried about. She'd made the fire because in the world she'd known, a fire at night was a good way to keep off predators. But those were animals she knew. Probably more importantly, they were animals that had generations upon generations of evolution to teach them that humans were dangerous and a fire was likely to mean humans. But was that true of dinosaurs? For all she knew, a fire might draw them like moths to a lightbulb. So, she'd had to guess, and she hated guessing.

In the end, what had tipped the scales was a simple fact. Twice now, she'd encountered dangerous animals out here up close. The first had been the cat-thing that Hulbert had shot before it could attack her.

Jeff had told her later it was a Smilodon of some sort. What they called a "saber-toothed tiger" but wasn't really a tiger. In fact, it wasn't closely related to modern cats of any kind. The second was the bear that had injured Joe so badly. That it wasn't any bear species she knew didn't mean anything. It was some kind of bear, for sure.

Mammals, both times. Not dinosaurs. The fact was, although they'd seen dinosaurs, they didn't seem to be plentiful. Not big ones, anyway.

Since escaping the prison, she'd seen a few creatures that were either dinosaurs or some kind of ancient reptiles. But none of them had been big, and none of them had been threatening in any way. In fact, most of them had run away as soon as they became aware of the humans approaching. That wasn't surprising. It was what you'd expect, unless the Quiver had transported them into some kind of fantasy world. In the real world, big animals were scarce. Wilderness or not, it didn't matter. That was true of herbivores, and it was even more true of carnivores. They couldn't be plentiful, because there wasn't enough food to support them. Even the huge bison herds of America's past hadn't really covered the plains. It just looked like it, when you were in their vicinity. But most of the plains, at any given time, had been empty of any big creatures. So, she'd decided to take their chances on the dinosaurs. She was more worried about something less exotic. Granted, the mammals of this time didn't have the same ingrained instinct to avoid humans. But she was still hoping they'd stay away from fire. And all of that was probably beside the point.

Everybody was exhausted and scared half out of their wits. Whether making and keeping a fire through the night was the right thing to do or not, it helped settle everyone down. Including her. "Mind a little company?" Frank Nickerson sat down next to her. "How're you doing?" she asked, not taking her eyes from the orange, red and blue flickering light. "That toothbrush you took in your leg did some damage." "It's been a while now. It seems to have healed pretty good."

"The nurses look at your stitches?" "Yeah. They're going to take them out in a few days." After a short pause, he said: "They told me what you did at the infirmary. I still feel bad that I wasn't there when that bastard came in. They sent me to A-block just six hours before the shit hit the fan." "What could you have done anyway, Frank? You didn't have a gun. Collins would have just shot you as soon as he came through the door." "Marie, what you did…" "Let it go, Frank. I wasn't being a hero. I was scared spitless. I can't even remember the details of it now. It's just a disjointed blur." She tilted her head so she could see the stars. They were as beautiful as they had been the night before and the night before that. She didn't think she would ever tire of looking at them or ever get used to how plentiful they had become. There was no light pollution at all in this new world.

Unless the moon was out at night, the darkness was like nothing she'd ever imagined. She dropped another stick on the fire. "I wish we had a radio so we could just call the others." Frank shook his head. "It wouldn't do any good. They didn't take one with them. They were going to be out of range after just a few hours." "I hope they're all right." She had to work at keeping her voice steady. For her, as for all of them, the greatest fear was that something bad had happened to Captain Blacklock and the rest of the guards. As long as Andy and Rod were out there somewhere, safe and sound and with well-armed people around them, things would eventually work out okay. But if they were gone… He nodded. After a while, he said: "No one talks about what happened to the rest of the world. It's like it never existed."