7 What a Croc!

Chapter 7 WHAT A CROC! EEEK! "Crocodile!" squeaked Thudd. "Super- crocodile! Eat dinosaurs for lunch!" Andrew had seen crocodiles at the zoo, but this one was so much bigger than those. This crocodile was longer than a dump truck! Judy didn't see the crocodile. She was digging sand out of her ears. "Everybody out!" yelled Andrew. "Eeeeeyah!" yelled Judy as she stumbled and flopped through the water. Beeper had already sloshed his way to the muddy stream bank.

meep… "Crocodile bite strong, strong, strong!" said Thudd. "No animal bite hard as super- crocodile bite. Not even Tyrannosaurus!" Andrew left Thudd and the DNA Detector on a flat stone. He splashed into the water and yanked Judy up. BROOOAAARRR! A rumble like a terrible toilet flushing came from behind them. Andrew turned to see the crocodile lunge forward. It opened its mouth so wide, Uncle Al could have stood up inside it! It slammed its toothy jaws shut so fast that Andrew didn't see them close. "Yeeeeeouch!" screamed Judy. "It's got my hair!"

The crocodile was pulling Judy backward through the water. "Yaaaaaaaaaaaah!" she screamed. Andrew grabbed one of Judy's legs. "Beeper!" yelled Andrew. Beeper was holding Thudd up to his ear. "Hoo boy!" yelled Beeper. "Thudd says we gotta hit the croc on the nose!" He picked up a stone and threw it. It splashed down in front of Andrew. Judy reached behind her. She began to beat the crocodile on the nose with her fists. Whap! Whap! Whap! The crocodile snapped its jaws open for a second and Judy tugged her head away! Beeper threw another rock. It landed in front of the crocodile. The crocodile dove to search for it. Andrew and Judy scrambled out of the water. All three of them ran deeper into the forest. After a few minutes, they were out of breath and stopped.

"Here ya go," said Beeper, handing Thudd back to Andrew. meep… "Oody okey-dokey?" squeaked Thudd. "Yeah," said Judy, "but my hair feels shorter." Andrew broke off a large leaf from a tree and wrapped it around Thudd. "My pockets are wet," he said, putting Thudd in his pajama pocket. "This leaf will keep you dry." RRROHHHURROHRR! THUMMMPP… THUMMMPP… THUMMMPP… The ground shook. meep… "Tyrannosaurus come back!" squeaked Thudd. "Not again!" hollered Judy. Andrew couldn't see the dinosaur through the trees, but the thumps were getting louder. KRAAAAAACK! KRUNNNCHHH! Trees were snapping! The Tyrannosaurus was knocking them down!

They ran deeper into the forest. Andrew spied a rocky wall ahead. He couldn't see a way around it. They were trapped! "We've got to climb that wall!" shouted Andrew. Andrew started up first. The black rock was jagged and rough on his bare feet, but he found places to step and places to grab. There were small trees growing between cracks in the rock. Andrew hung on to these, too, as he scrambled up. "Hoo boy!" said Beeper, following. "This is better than the climbing wall at the mall. They make you wear a harness." They reached a place where the rock wall was smooth and bare. Andrew couldn't see a way to get any farther up. The Tyrannosaurus had reached the rock wall. Its scaly head was close to their feet. RRROHHHURROHRR! The sound shook Andrew's bones and made his ears ache.

The edge of Andrew's ledge began to crumble. He pushed his feet closer together. Judy was standing on a ledge next to Andrew. Her ledge was crumbling, too. "So what do we do now, Bug-Brain?" she asked. "We're thirty seconds away from turning into a Tyranno-snack." "Just hang on," said Andrew. "Maybe it will go away when it figures out it can't get us." The Tyrannosaurus's tiny arms were ripping bushes out of the cliff. The dinosaur was trying to climb up! Pieces of stone cracked away from the cliff and rained down to the ground below. "Or maybe it will wait till there's an avalanche and we fall into its mouth," said Judy. Suddenly something thick and green dropped down in front of Andrew. It was a rope made of vines!