Chapter 114: Sobek's cunning vs the invincible human technology

"It's working. The perimeter holds up. Thirty minutes have passed and the spinosaurus did no damage" Gene said. "You were right, Roland" "Marvelous!" Ludlow looked like a child who had just been given an Easter egg. "Colonel Hicks just announced that the army has entered the city. In a few minutes the assault team will enter the area and fix the spinosaurus properly!" Ebert wrinkled his nose. "Good. I hope everything goes smoothly" he said, then turning to Roland: "Do you know something about the animal that we should know?" Roland shook his head. "I have only observed it twice. It is a completely unknown creature. We don't know how it hunts, how it behaves or how it thinks. All I know is what you already know" "Seriously? Nothing else?" Ludlow shivered. "Blame yourself, Mr.Ludlow. You wanted to exhibit the animal immediatly, without knowing anything about it. You didn't wait even a few days to make sure the cage could contain it. Now we can just wait and watch" the hunter replied with a reproachful look. "And let's hope it doesn't have some hidden abilities" ************ A huge convoy consisting of four tanks and at least a hundred soldiers entered the dangerous area. Several helicopters wanted above them to provide reconnaissance and air support. "Men, march!" the captain ordered. At his signal, the entire convoy set off. Over the radio came the voice of the pilot on the helicopter: "Go to Filmur Street. The spinosaurus is there, we are seeing it" That was the great advantage of humans: not only did they have powerful weapons, but thanks to their machines they also had a broader view of the battlefield, which was a factor to be reckoned with in a fight. However, this was true if the battle took place in the open field. But in the city everything changed. "It's moving! It went behind a building, I can't see it anymore!" the reconnaissance exclaimed. "Now we are moving too and... what!?" On land, the captain clearly heard the scout's curse over the radio. "What happens?" "The spinosaurus... has disappeared! We can no longer find it even with infrared! It is as if it had volatilized!" "Scout, explain yourself better! What does 'volatilized' mean?" "There is no more! I don't understand... it disappeared into thin air!" The captain swallowed a lump of saliva. He didn't like the situation at all. A dinosaur certainly could not disappear. He could understand if the scouts were no longer able to see it because of the buildings... but how was it possible that even the infrared sensors could not detect it? "Open your eyes!" he ordered. "Keep your guns raised and ready to fire! Let's proceed with caution..." BOOOM! The captain just had time to turn around before he saw one of the tanks lift up and overturn as if it were made of cardboard. At least five soldiers were crushed by the danger and at least ten others were injured by the explosion that occurred as soon as the gasoline was exposed to the air. And in the midst of that disaster, a giant dinosaur more than nine meters high was preying on the other soldiers. "It's here!" the captain was shocked. How did the spinosaurus appear without anyone seeing it coming? "Shoot!" But the tank pointer was not fast. It took a few seconds for it to lock onto the target. And before they could, the spinosaurus had already retreated and disappeared behind the buildings. The military had no way of chasing him. They certainly couldn't shoot at houses probably full of people! "Did we hurt it?" the captain asked. "No, sir. The bullets didn't do it much damage. We just put it on the run! " answered his second-in-command. Neither of them had seen a single drop of blood emerge from the spinosaurus after they riddled it with machine guns, but if he retreated they must have hurt him at least. "Scout, do you see it?" the captain asked on the radio. "No! We followed it for a couple of blocks and then we lost it again. It disappeared again! " was the answer that reached the radio. The captain was about to reply when time seemed to stand still. For an instant, a single instant, everything seemed to freeze in his eyes. Almost in passing, he could see a huge figure that suddenly appeared seemingly out of nowhere, and launched itself at a second tank... "IT CAN CAMOUFLAGE!!!" His scream was useless. The spinosaurus lifted the tank as if it were a twig and threw it in his direction. The captain barely had time to breathe before the huge 40-ton vehicle hit him. ********** Sobek fled the battlefield again as soon as they started shooting at him. He had no reason to do otherwise: any animal, faced with that noise and thousands of bullets hitting his skin, would have retreated immediately. Perhaps a tyrannosaurus would have been proud enough not to flee, but Sobek wasn't willing to wait for the tanks to target him. [Recognized element: bazooka] [Recognized element: missile launcher] [Recognized element: molotov] Each time he attacked he was able to observe more of the convoy, and with it new windows opened in his [Weapon system]. Very quickly all the boxes were unlocking. There were two reasons why he had been captured. The first was that he wanted to get fame points to unlock the next evolution. The second was that in that city he could completely unlock the [Weapon system] with minimal risk! In the movies, the military was often shown as people that arrive and shoot in bursts destroying half the city, regardless of everything and everyone and with the only intent on destroying the monster. Total bullshit. The military was tasked with eliminating threats. If they had shot in a place full of people, what would have been the difference from letting the monster do its work? The population couldn't be evacuated from the big cities in a few hours, let alone a few minutes. Not to mention that with a giant beast around people would never leave their safe homes, delaying the rescue even further. Unless the monster in question was an enamored fool like King Kong, who had placed himself in a nice position at the top of the Empire State Building where planes could easily hit him, there was no way the military could safely face it. If Sobek had faced the human army in a open plain, or in the forest, then he would have had no chance. The planes and tanks would have devastated the entire environment around him to track him down and he would have ended up being torn apart. But this couldn't happen in a city. Tanks couldn't fire unless they were certain that they could hit the target, or they could destroy a building full of people. The planes couldn't drop bombs on him. Although humans had very powerful weapons, they had no way of using them there. Sobek was in human territory, but he was the one with the advantage! And thanks to this advantage, the [Weapon system] boxes were unlocking one by one. [Recognized element: mortar] [Recognized element: cannon] [Recognized element: landmine] Ludlow had announced Sobek to the world as a prisoner who had been defeated by human intelligence. But in reality it was Sobek's cunning that beat the superb and seemingly invincible technology that made humans so powerful! *********** "Does that dinosaur camouflage!?" Ebert roared. "Why didn't anyone know?" "It never did that. We couldn't have known" Roland replied sadly. Ludlow was shocked. "But ... but how is it possible?" he asked trembling. "Many animals can camouflage very well. They can even alter body heat to make themselves invisible to those predators with thermographic vision, like snakes" Roland replied. "I had never seen a dinosaur do it, but..." "Who cares! How do we stop it?" Ebert bellowed. "I'm afraid I don't know. If it can camouflage, then the army is in a difficult position too" Roland replied. "The only solution is to send more soldiers and force the spinosaurus into a corner. Contact colonel Hicks and..." "Nobody will contact anyone!" Ebert, Gene, Roland, and Ludlow turned to the door. A group of people had appeared at the door of it; it was the man who stood in the center who spoke, an old man with a white beard and glasses holding a stick ending in an amber. Everyone recognized him at first sight: "John Hammond!" It was him: the former tycoon owner of Mega Beast Park. Although he was now old and visibly ill, at that moment he emanated an aura of authority, as if he had regained the strength of when he was a boy. "Uncle! How long has it been..." Ludlow obviously didn't miss a chance to be friendly, but Hammond ignored him in disgust. "Listen to them" he said pointing to the people behind him. "They have a much better plan than yours" It was only when the old man spoke that the people in the room remembered that he had not come alone. "Professor Grant!" Ludlow exclaimed in surprise, recognizing the famous biologist. "And... Ian Malcolm?" "Ehy, I'm a professor too" Ian reminded him. Ludlow moved his finger nervously, pointing to the others present. "And you are Sarah Hardy... we spoke on video call, remember?". The woman didn't even give him a look. "And who are they?" There were two people Ludlow had no idea who they were: a boy and a girl. "This is Billy, Alan's pupil, and this is my daughter Katy" Ian said hastily. "Well, we're done with the introductions. Can we proceed?" "Yes... Yes, right!" Ebert exclaimed, remembering why they were there. "What plan do you have in mind? Speak, quickly!" "Very simple" Alan said stepping forward. "The other dinosaurs are the key to our salvation" "The other dinosaurs?" "Exactly. As Roland here surely has already told you, that animal is defining a territory. And the first thing predators do when defining a territory is eliminate all competitors" Professor Grant explained. "Humans have proven they can hunt its preys, so now from its point of view humans are something that must be eliminated. But if you catch another carnivorous dinosaur and tie it to a truck, the spinosaurus will chase after it to kill it. You can then lure it away from the city where it can be safely eliminated" Gene and Ebert looked at each other in confusion. They didn't understand much about dinosaur biology and behavior, but professor Grant seemed pretty convincing. "It can work" Roland confirmed, who having experience with animals saw the potential of the plan. Ludlow was skeptical, however. "How can we be sure it will attack another dinosaur? That animal has already reserved too many surprises for us..." "Because it already has" Billy interrupted. "When it came out of the enclosure at the zoo, it immediately attacked the carnotaur in the enclosure next door, even though it hadn't done anything to the spinosaurus. It chased that poor animal throughout all the zoo as if its own life depended on its destruction. It wanted to kill the carnotaur, not because of hunger but to eliminate competition from the territory" Ludlow found no other reason to reply. Ebert and Gene looked at each other, then the mayor nodded. Gene grabbed the radio. "To all units! Spread around the area and look for other carnivorous dinosaurs! As soon as you find one, drug it and put it in plain sight on a vehicle!" ******** [Recognized element: anti-tank mine] "It was the last!" Sobek roared triumphantly. "I did it! I unlocked the whole [Weapon system]!" Suddenly he received a notification from the System. [Congratulations! You have unlocked all the weapons the System can provide you. As a result, you have unlocked your Personal Weapon!] "Eh!? And what is this?" Sobek exclaimed. Was it possible that for every flight that he thought he understood the System was popping up functions he had never heard of? "Nevermind. I'll think about it later. This is not the right moment!" Now that he had obtained all the weapons, he had no more reason to remain in the human city. It was time for him to leave. He could have used [Ambush] and disappeared, but that would have made humans suspicious: a camouflaged dinosaur might not be something weird, but what about one who instead of hunting and eating prefers to disappear forever, like that, for no reason? He wouldn't have put on such a play if he hadn't wanted humans to find out about his intelligence. He needed a reason to leave. He raised his head to the sky and roared loudly: "Carnopo, it's time!"