Lost in The End Part 4: Coming of Age

Part 4: Coming of Age

The chapparal was silent, not a chirp from a pterosaur, or a dinosaur. Two days had passed since that fateful battle, and the young Tyrant King still had not awoke. The sun was high in the sky, but its light was shielded mostly by massive cumulus clouds, like cauliflower in the sky. Fractals of light were able to pierce through the clouds, spotlighting select areas of the land—Tyran was one of them. The light from the sun beamed down upon the tyrannosaur, and his eyelids finally opened, revealing his blue eyes once more to the Earth. He blinked a few times, trying to recall what happened to him last, and where he was. Tyran rolled himself over from his side to his belly, and used his muscular thighs and arms to lift himself up to his feet.

He shook his head and snorted, blinking more than usual—adjusting his eyes to the sun. Tyran looked to his upper-right, a massive rumble had just shook the Earth, nearly knocking him over again. A volcano had erupted, spewing lava down upon the land, and leaving a thick wave of noxious gas in the air—flowing into a beachside. It was far away from Tyran, who turned to his left and stumbled off, trying to move—hunger, injury, and fatigue hindering him. Acid rain clouds were off in the distance, melting clay hills and rock build-ups. Tyran stopped at the edge of the chaparral, about to enter another desert. To the far right he saw a rare sight nowadays, a herd of Alamosaurus, Triceratops, and Anatotitan.

They were feasting on newly evolved plants, grass, and drinking water from a pond next to a waterfall. Tyran looked at them with a curious gaze, before something from the distant desert caught his eye. He looked in-front of him to see creatures appearing from the base of a cliff, theropods! The young rex immediately bolted for the nearest clay covering, and hid underneath it—for six Mapusaurus were standing at the top of a cliff! Fearsome predators, notorious for taking down sauropods. Tyran’s eyes focused, and fear filled his body, as from his clay covering he watched the mapusaurs prowl through the desert.

They were led by a deep-red feathered orange-scaled alpha mapusaur, sixteen-feet tall at-least. He cooed orders to his other five, telling each one to do specific things, like a scout to their left and right, and smell if there was prey in the distance. They had been visibly affected by the extinction, with some of the mapusaurs having massive gashes across their side—or being extremely emaciated. The Alpha however, looked reasonable, there was damage to his body no doubt—but he didn’t look that much different from the normal Mapusaurus. Tyran’s fear eased, and he relaxed his leg muscles, as the mapusaurs did not seem like they were angry or enraged.

The mapusaur pack stopped at the top of the hill, and lowered into a predatory stance, all six of them. Dread chilled Tyran’s bones, believing the predators had caught his scent; he flung his body to the right, prepared to run, before he saw something out of the corner of his eye. The world ran cold, pterosaurs scattered in all directions, and the mapusaurs turned back with fear, as a massive rock was hurled over them and crashed into the desert—exploding into countless rocks. Tyran returned his gaze to the mapusaurs, as from the base of the hill, the demonic pale-white theropod stood up-right. It was almost etherial in its gaze, which pierced the souls of all who saw it.

Dread filled the entire desert, as the alpha Mapusaurus bellowed madly at the figure, and the rest of his pack did the same—but the being did not move. Tyran’s pupils dilated and his eyes widened, as the peace collapsed in an instant—the demon charged. The young rex looked away from the battle, hearing the yells of pain from the mapusaurs, the cacophony of bones breaking and blood splattering onto the clay and rock. He opened his eye briefly, and saw the battle reflected off a nearby watering hole next to his covering. The water distorted the onslaught, but it was visible; a mapusaur was dead, and another was next. The demon swatted away the Alpha to the ground with a back-hand, and threw the beta and omega aside with his jaw, before engaging a sentinel of the pack.

With ease he overpowered the theropod, clamping onto its snout and yanking back, leaving it bleeding uncontrollably. The demon grabbed the throat of the lone mapusaur, lifted it into the air, and slammed it into a small mesa over and over. It obliterated the theropod’s spine and ribs, destroying parts of the mesa with each smash. A bright smile appeared on the demon’s maw, as it grabbed the jaw of the mapusaur with both of its four-fingered hands, and began to crush its skull. Blood coated the wall of the mesa, and streamed down the body of the theropod, as the mapusaur’s skull began to crack and weaken underneath the sheer strength of this demon.

Acid rain pummeled the desert from above, sheering the feathers and scales of the combatants, all but the demon—who seemed immune to any form of damage. The Alpha Mapusaurus, Beta, and Omega all stood up, and charged the pale-white creature, but they were too late, as the acid rain collapsed the mesa, and the massive rocks fell down upon the demon and the lone mapusaur. The remaining mapusaurs stopped in their tracks and looked at the destruction. Their pack-mate, was dead amongst the rubble, along with the other two killed directly by this creature, but it seemed as though the demon itself, was dead.

The mapusaurs cooed in agony and sorrow for their dead members, but the Alpha seemed to take it the hardest, as he simply held his head down—and kept his eyes closed. Tyran almost felt the same feelings, as he had watched the whole battle. The young rex blinked, prepared to leave and continue his journey, but that was not to be. Tyran threw his face back through the covering again, as the demon burst out through the rubble! The Alpha Mapusaurus bellowed as his remaining pack cowered behind him, and the demon moved on them without hesitation. They were next to a small cliff that fell into a deep river.

The Alpha looked behind him to see this, and knowing they could not defeat this Unstoppable Lord, ordered him and his pack to walk off into the river. The demon swiped at them, but missed as they rolled off the cliff and into the river, vanishing into deep water. The Unstoppable Lord looked from the top of the cliff with a confused and angered gaze, before calming down, and almost admiring the cunning of his opponents. Tyran watched on from his covering, as the creature turned back to the desert. He snorted and licked blood from his claws, before slowly look to his right at Tyran’s covering.

The demon blinked, before an awful smirk appeared across its jaw. Tyran immediately turned around and bolted away from the desert and down a cliff, not wasting a second to escape this monster. He bolted down the cliff, each step sounding like thunder, and with what felt like the force of a lightning bolt underneath each step; he was going as fast as he could, he knew he couldn’t face this monstrosity. The Unstoppable Lord, the demon who killed three of the strongest predators to ever exist with ease, had caught on to the scent of Tyran.

For a single second in time, the scent brushed by his olfactory bulbs, and out. The Unstoppable Lord closed his eyes and analyzed what he had smelled; it, smelled like his nemesis, the one that got away. The Unstoppable Lord bellowed a screeching roar, throwing his neck out and falling to his knees on the ground. He slammed his hands into the ground, leaving a massive crater in the rocky desert, before throwing himself to his feet and charging after the faint scent he had detected. The demon furrowed his brow and opened his mouth agape like a rabid beast, the only thought on his mind—killing the one that got away.

Lightning struck in the distance, as Tyran passed through a plain. Rain poured down from above, drenching Tyran’s green feathers, and bringing his mood down to an all time low. He strode through the plain, each step devastating grass and leaving a footprint, as Tyran held his head down low. He began to feel anger, and rage; he was lost from his family, abandoned from all he knew, and on top of all this he didn’t know how to survive in the wild—he didn’t even know how to hunt. The young rex walked through the plain, until he came to a stop; something had absorbed him from a short while ahead. A wondrous scent, a delicious smell—the smell of Triceratops.

Tyran raised his head, the boom of thunder filling his ears in the distance, and the coldness of the water nearly making him chill. A trike was ahead of him, a sub-adult male. His blue eyes analyzed the prey, but he doubted his ability to kill it, he couldn’t even take down an Anatotitan. Tyran felt as though he had nothing left to lose, and pushed himself forward. Tyran stomped in-front of the Triceratops, facing it directly, not holding any secrets. The herbivore rose its neck up, and bellowed at him with fear. A trike never runs, and this one was no exception; the herbivore rose its body up and slammed its feet down into the ground, the thunder and rain chilling this battlefield.

Tyran snorted, fear out of his body and his inhibitions gone. The two encircled each-other, each step matching the thunder in the back. Tyran flexed his muscles in preparation, as the Trike began to grow antsy, and finally charged. The Triceratops charged Tyran full force, but the young rex wasn’t going down so easy, and side-stepped it, sending the Trike crashing into a nearby tree. Tyran took advantage, and clamped onto the back of the Triceratops, sinking his teeth into its flesh and nearly severing the vertebrae. Tyran lifted his right foot up and sank his talons into the back of the Trike, as it bellowed in pain, and blood poured out from its wounds.

The Triceratops wouldn’t be going down that easy however, as it stomped his hoof on Tyran’s left foot and rammed his skull with its frill. The young rex spun to his left, grunting in pain, before turning his head to his right with a slight smirk. He charged the Triceratops and clamped onto its horn, biting down with all his force. The Trike bellowed in pain, as unbelievably, its horn began to crack, and shatter underneath fourteen-thousand pounds of force. Tyran crushed the left horn of the Trike underneath his maw, before ramming its head down with a falling slam from his chin.

The herbivore was finished, and seemingly stood no chance against this tyrannosaur, who placed his left foot on his back, and went in for the finishing blow to the neck. But it wouldn’t be over that quickly, as lightning struck a tree, setting it ablaze, the Triceratops sprung back to action and ramming Tyran’s ribs with its horn-stump. He roared aloud in pain and stumbled to his left, whipping the Trike’s face with his tail in the process. The herbivore collapsed to its right against the force of the tail, and Tyran wasted nothing this time, charging in and clamping onto the beast’s neck. He bit down, blood streaming from its bloody gashes and severed vertebrae, as the tyrannosaur clamped with all his might—achieving sixteen-thousand pounds of pressure.

A final bolt of lightning struck, masking the sound of a neck breaking underneath the force of a true Tyrant King. Rain fell down the shoulders of the legend, as he held the lifeless form of the trike in his maw, before dropping it underneath a tree. Tyran panted heavily, amazed at what he had accomplished. He turned his head to his left, threw his neck up, and bellowed a dominant fearsome roar of power towards the moon. His childhood was over, this tyrant, was now ready to take his place among the legends. Tyran, might just make it.

Part 4 end.