PANIC ROOM • KENJI KON

XXXVIII. Crates of Food

"Awe, I'm so glad a T-Rex appeared in your parents backyard!" Sammy grinned.

Eva pulled her into a side hug. "Me too, girly."

"They're not all bad," Ben said as he deviated from their path.

Eva furrowed her eyebrows, but slowly followed after him. The other joined, too. Ben crept up to a large fallen tree, gasping as he peered over the top. The campers followed suit, their faces lighting up in amazement.

A herd of about nine gallimimus grazed on insects and grubs and small berries from an untouched berry bush.

Eva awe'd as she watched the dinosaurs simply existing, minding their own business.

"See? They know how to survive," Ben grinned, referring to the grubs they were eating.

Apparently on Ben's time alone in the wilderness, he turned to eating grubs to survive. When he brought the idea to the campers attention earlier that morning, everyone groaned in disgust and called him gross.

"Not a chance, Ben," Kenji told him. "I'm hungry, but not, willing to eat bugs, hungry."

"We'll go look for food..." Brooklynn glared at Darius, "Together."

Darius grimaced in response.

"We can't wait too long," Ben said. "The storm wiped out everything."

Yasmina groaned. "I can't believe we survived big game hunters only to be starved to death by a storm."

Eva cleared her throat. "Technically they'd be poachers, since I'm guessing all their 'prizes' were hunted illegally."

Yasmina glared at her. Eva raised her hands in surrender. "I'll shut up now."

"Don't worry," Darius reassured. "We'll find more food."

Above, a pteronadon screeched. Eva instinctively ducked down. A group of five flying dinosaurs flew into the clearing. The gallimimus bellowed in panic and began to scatter in all directions.

Oh look, they know what scatter means, too.

The campers ducked below the tree trunk as a pteronadon flew into the top of it, rocking the trunk. On the other side of the tree, chaos ensued. Both pteranodons and gallimimus shrieked and squawked. A few times, something hit up against the tree they were using as their hiding spot.

Eva's hand flew over her mouth, and she pressed herself against both the tree, and Kenji. His hand snaked around her shoulders, and the pair jumped at every noise.

Finally, the clearing quieted— so calm and serene, it was like there were no dinosaurs there to begin with.

"I don't know if it's safe to go," Darius whispered.

Eva opened her eyes, blinking away the sunlight. On her right, Sammy was sitting on her legs with her head propped into her hands. She sat up swiftly, quietly, and shot a careful look at Eva.

"We don't want to get caught in the middle of a food fight."

"You wanna wait until it gets worse?" Kenji asked, his arm dropping from around Eva. "No thanks, we need to run."

Why did she mentally frown? Why did she suddenly miss his warmth?

"Did you hear how quiet it got?" Sammy whispered. "We could be ambushed. We should stay hidden until we know what's out there."

"I'll tell you what's out there, nothing good," Kenji whispered back. "We have to run, now."

"No, Kenji. We need to wait here and figure out what's what."