“Imagine having seen a violin but never heard one played. Would you truly understand what a violin is? I don’t think so. This will be the same. You’ve been to the museums, you’ve seen the bones — but you don’t really know what a T-Rex was. Is.

“There’s only so much we can do to prepare ourselves for an environment we know almost nothing about, but we’re going anyway because it’s worth the risk. We’ll maintain radio contact, we’ll stay with our guards, and we’ll meet back at the rendezvous site on time. Right? Good. So… any final questions?”

Greta Gilbert, professor of botany, met the eye of their mission leader and shook her head, as did the five other scientists present. She couldn’t think of any questions, but she wasn’t sure she could think of her own phone number just then either.

A few seconds later, Greta followed the young soldier charged with her protection into the portal — and into history.

* * *

She was no physicist, but Greta was pretty sure time had passed at the same speed in the Cretaceous as in the present. But that’s not what it felt like. Most of the hour they’d been granted for their initial survey had already elapsed, but it seemed like they’d only just started. Everywhere she looked another wonder revealed itself, another tree or vine or fern so alien it could have been from another planet rather than an older Earth.

And that was just the plants. The pterosaurs circling high overhead were difficult to look away from, even for a botanist.

“Team Leader, this is Carter. Do you read?” spoke Greta’s young escort into his radio for the twentieth time. Communications had been sketchy at best. Either something in the environment was hampering the signals, or else the equipment had been damaged coming through the portal.

“Carter, this is… Everything’s okay. Just fired a few… scare away a… Ten minutes… rendezvous.”

“Understood,” answered the soldier. Then to Greta, he added, “At least I think I understood. They must have fired those shots we heard to scare something off. And he’s right, we only have ten minutes left. Maybe we should start back now.”

“We probably should,” Greta admitted, “but let’s hustle up that next rise first, just to see what’s beyond it. Won’t take a minute.”

Carter, who was also having the time of his life, nodded and smiled after barely any hesitation.

Partway up the hill, more gunfire erupted in the distance, immediately followed by the voice of their team leader over the radio. This time the message was even more garbled, so much so that only a couple words were discernible.

“Did he say blind dinosaurs?” Carter asked. “Is that a thing?”

Greta shrugged and said, “I mean… who knows? But I wouldn’t expect to find any here. Blind animals live in caves or deep underwater — places without light.”

Another spatter of gunfire sounded in the distance, followed by a gurgle of static from the radio.

“Team Leader, this is Carter. What’s your status? Team Leader, do you read?” When no response came, Carter checked his watch and said, “You know what, Doc, I’m calling it. It’s time to go.”

“Yeah, okay,” the older woman agreed. “Wait, what’s that?”

Carter looked in the direction the scientist was pointing, just over the hill they’d nearly crested. “Looks like a bundle of corn stalks, like they use for decorations at the cider mills back home. But bigger. Think a caveman could have done that?”

“No. People won’t show up on Earth for many millions of years from now. Whatever it is, it must have grown that way. But it really does look arranged, doesn’t it? Tell you what, we’ll run up there, take a quick look, and then we’ll go. Please.”

The soldier frowned but nodded.

Greta did her best to keep her handheld camera steady as the two moved into a jog. Silently, she thanked her husband for talking her into that spinning class. Beside her, Carter kept his rifle level, pointed forward.

As they shuffled to a halt before the strange bundle of plant stalks, Carter suddenly gasped.

“I just thought of something. Remember in that movie, where that weird little dinosaur could spit in your face, make you go blind. What if that’s real? What if that’s what they were trying to warn us about?”

“I guess it’s possible,” Greta conceded, huffing a bit at the exertion. “But that was just a fun trick for the movie. There’s no evidence that anything like that actually existed. It’s more likely we just heard it wrong. He was probably saying something about a blind spot for our scanners, or some aspect of this ancient world we’ve been blind to, or—”

“Or maybe he was talking about a blind. You know, like a hunter’s blind.”

Comprehension dawned simultaneously for the soldier and the scientist — but too late. They were too close.

And the raptors were much, much too fast.