Chapter 64: The most intelligent

The spinosaurus rose to its feet to its full height and roared so loud it shook the leaves of the trees. With its more than seven meters in height, it was roughly the size of a two-story building. Seen from the perspective of a human being, it was as if a house had come to life. Every inch of its body gave off a sense of sheer might and power. Mitch was sure this would have been his last day, but the spinosaurus completely ignored he and the his companions and launched itself at the helicopter. The flying craft rolled away from the force of the blow, but the dinosaur didn't seem to want to stop raging on it. Walking very quickly, it chased the helicopter until it stopped moving and then crushed it with one of its gigantic feet; the metal bent like butter under the force of its weight. Mitch breathe deeply, trying to think again. This was a golden opportunity for them! "Quick! Go into the forest and climb to the trees!" he yelled starting to run, promptly followed by the pilot and Jamie. Neither of them tried to dispute him in the least: who would have been crazy enough to stay out in the open field with that monster around? Fortunately, most of the tallest trees in the jungle were full of holds. Having led so many expeditions, Mitch knew how to climb them easily and very fast. Jamie had learned this from him and the pilot just copied their movements. All they had to do was keep climbing until they reached a height higher than that of the spinosaurus, or until the leaves had hidden them. In this way, that animal couldn't have found them or reached them. Once at the top of the trees they could clearly see the spinosaurus, which was using its claws to open the helicopter as if it were a tinfoil bag. It looked pissed off as never before. Its claws kept hitting the metal, cutting it instantly. Jamie was shocked in seeing that. "That helicopter is made of steel!" she exclaimed. Mitch couldn't believe it either. What strength must those claws possess? What kind of muscles governed them? When he inspected the animal's paws he had assumed they were really strong, but he hadn't thought they were SO strong! What animal possessed such powerful force that it cut steel so easily? Jamie pulled out her cell phone and started filming. Documenting what was happening was the only way she could stop imagine the jaws of that beast closing on her. Even though she was in a safe position now, just watching the creature's ferocity made her shiver. Under their gaze, the spinosaurus sank its nose into the helicopter and began to tear it apart from the inside. Apparently it really had hated the sound that the flying vehicle had made. From the way it was destroying it, it seemed intent on not leaving even the smallest of joints intact. For Mitch all this made no sense. How did the spinosaurus know what the narcotic dart was for? Logically, it shouldn't even have known about the existence of a rifle with sleeping pills! Wait... All the pieces began to fit together in Mitch's mind. It wasn't possible... what intelligence must that dinosaur possess!? "The bullets!" Jamie looked at him confused: "What are you saying?" Mitch began to gesticulate: "When the kidnappers of the girl attacked the spinosaurus, they used low-caliber rifles, but anyway it must have understood that those things were used to hurt it... and when the Jersey's soldiers attacked the torvosaurus they have used other weapons! The spinosaurus has learned to associate weapons and bullets with death! That's what happened... when the narcotic dart fell into the water the spinosaurus must have mistaken it for a bullet, so it pretended to have been hit. It wasn't pretending to sleep, it was pretending to be dead! It wanted us to feel safe and ditch the narcotics rifle, because it reminded it of the weapons with which humans had attacked it before, and so it realized that was our only way by which we could hurt it... and now it's destroying the helicopter because it fears there are other weapons inside. It knows that we aren't a threat but the weapons are!" Jamie looked at him in amazement. If her professor had said similar things earlier she would have assumed he had lost his mind... but now it really seemed the only possible solution. This was absurd. How much intelligent that dinosaur was? Such behavior was indicative of a remarkable degree of awareness! No other creature in the world had ever shown that it could learn and understand so much so quickly! Her spine froze. If that was the case, then it was unlikely that the spinosaurus would have let them go. If it associated them with a threat, then it would have searched them once the helicopter was destroyed until it found and eliminated them! They could stay in the trees, but could the trees hold up against claws that could even cut through steel? "What do we do?" she asked in a trembling voice. Mitch seemed to have made her own thoughts. "We have to scary it and make it go away now" he said pulling out a gun. With the experience that distinguished the old people ('old'... middle-aged in his case), he had learned that you should never let your guard down, so for years now he had always carried a weapon for emergencies. "It's impossible for that little gun to hurt that monster!" the pilot protested. It was true: such small bullets wouldn't even have scratched the spinosaurus scales. That animal's skin was too thick for it to be injured with such a weak weapon. But Mitch remained impassive: he already knew that and in fact he wasn't aiming at the spinosaurus. He was aware that if he tried to hit it, he would only draw its attention to their hiding place. "I don't want to shoot it" he said, and then he fired. The bullet went through the air and hit the tail of the helicopter, which due to the violence of the spinosaurus was losing hectoliters of gasoline. In an instant the fuel caught fire and the helicopter's tail exploded. The spinosaurus took a few steps back and roared furiously. The fire engulfed the entire helicopter in seconds; perhaps on a planet like Earth it would have taken longer to spread, but on Eden, where the atmosphere was much richer in oxygen, the flames ran at frightening speed. Within moments the helicopter was completely engulfed in fire. Any animal at that point would have escape in terror. If there was one thing that all lifeforms wanted to keep away from, that was the fire. Fire was something that burned and suffocated and that had to be immediately avoided. For all animals, the fire was the absolute enemy from which everyone had to stay as far away as possible. But contrary to Mitch's expectations, it happened something that shocked him. The spinosaurus looked disoriented, but made no attempt to escape; on the contrary, it remained where it was. Then, to everyone's surprise, it approached the helicopter and after making sure that the flames couldn't reach its muzzle it inspected the interior, as if to make sure that everything was destroyed. "It isn't afraid of fire!?" Mitch exclaimed without words. The only living things in the world who weren't afraid of fire were humans! If that dinosaur wasn't afraid of flames, it meant that its intelligence was slightly below the one of the humans. It meant that its IQ was at least equal to the one of the Homo erectus! Not even chimpanzees reached such levels! The spinosaurus lifted its head angrily and sniffed the air. Mitch felt his breath catch, knowing it was looking for them, but he relaxed as the dinosaur started sneezing. Apparently the smoke was causing it trouble. The scene repeated itself for about three minutes, after which the spinosaurus decided that chasing them was too difficult and it returned to the river, moving away quickly. Mitch and the others waited a few minutes, expecting another trap, but the spinosaurus didn't return. Reluctantly, they climbed down from the trees. When they were on the shore they could breathe a sigh of relief: in the distance they could see the spinosaurus that was slowly disappearing from view. It was really gone. "Mitch..." Jamie murmured showing her cell phone. "I have taken everything from when it attacked the helicopter to now!" Mitch felt the urge to hug her student. "Send everything to our companions to the boat and tell Max to come here quickly. For now the fire will keep the animals away, but when it goes out we will be at the mercy of the beasts. Tell him to push the ship's engine hard and get to us as soon as possible" Within them fear was quickly giving way to excitement: what they had found wasn't just a new species and wasn't just even a very empathic dinosaur, it was potentially the second most intelligent life form on the planet!