*Ding* *Ding*
The bell sounded and the two men circled each other, fists up to protect their faces. They inched closer, firing soft jabs, looking for and opening until the taller one who looked to be almost seven feet tall through a big right hand. The man with (h/c) hair ducked it and fired back with quick strikes. The smaller man was by no means short, standing at about 6' 2" or 6' 3", but the larger man just towered over him. They continued to trade strikes for a while until (h/c) haired man faltered a moment and got hit with a right hook sending him stumbling back. The taller man looked to take advantage when...
*Ding* *Ding*
Round one ended and the two men returned to their corners. I watched terrified. How is he gonna win now? He got hit so hard. But his streak. He can't lose now. He just can't.
The man looked up, his eyes glazed but then he focused on me, making eye contact. Something glittered in his (e/c) eyes. Mischief? Hope? Excitement? Maybe a mix of all three? He nodded at me and I nodded back. I know he can do it.
The man stood up shakily, facing off with the much larger man. He held his hands up loosely like he didn't know where he was.
"Are you sure you can continue?" The referee asked.
"Just ring the damn bell." He growled.
With a sigh, the referee called for the bell.
*Ding* *Ding*
The larger man charged forward to take advantage of the smaller man's spaced-out state. The smaller man suddenly focused up and delivered a mighty roundhouse kick to the unprotected temple of the larger man. He crumpled to the floor instantly. The smaller man began to ground and pound until the ref pushed him away calling for the bell.
*Ding* *Ding* *Ding*
I was picked up by my mother who was wearing a yellow shirt and a matching yellow skirt. I was cheering loudly and so was my mother. She looked so young and so much happier. She carried me into the octagon where the man's arm was raised. "Ladies and gentlemen, here is your winner, Grant (L/N)!"He walked over to me and took me from my mother.
"There you are kiddo!" He said jovially.
"You did it, dad! You really beat him." I said, hugging him around the neck
"What do I always say?"
"I'm hungry?" that got a laugh out of my father.
"I mean about life."
"Adapt or die!" I said in a deep threatening voice, mocking him.
He laughed again, "Yep, it's probably the best lesson I can teach you. This world is gonna be tough on you but all you need is one moment, one chance, to make a statement. You feel me?" He said holding a fist out to me.
I gave him a fist bump and said, "You should be the champ."
"Oh really? I should be the champ?" then stopped to really consider it for a second.
"Oh, I love seeing my boys together." Said my mother coming over and giving my father a peck on the lips.
"Thanks for bringing him, honey. He really got me through this one." my dad said with a smile.
An interviewer came over asking to talk to my dad. He quickly handed me over to my mother and moved in front of the camera with the interviewer.
"I'm here with tonight's winner, Grant (L/N)." The interviewer started, "Grant, this win takes you to 30-0 in your last 30 matches. It's one of the most dominant runs that the LA MMA league has ever seen. Everyone wants to know, what's next for you and what you have to say about your historic winning streak?"
He handed my dad the mic awaiting his response. My father looked down for a moment pondering, then he looked at me and the look returned to his eye. He took a long breath, looked into the camera, then said four simple words.
"Give me the champ!"
He tossed the mic over his shoulder getting a huge roar of approval from the audience. He climbed the side of the octagon and sat on top, playing to the crowd. I watched as my father became my hero right in front of my eyes.
____________________________________________________________________________
I woke with a sharp inhale of breath. I looked around, remembering where I was. Asleep on the couch with... Brooklynn... resting her head on my shoulder. I felt a blush rise on my face.
Damn... she looks really cute, and her hair smells nice, kinda like... strawberries? Jesus (y/n), you're creepy as hell dude. You're not at camp to find a girlfriend, you're here to relax and see some cool shit.
Suddenly, Brooklynn began to stir. And in a genius move to save me from embarrassment, I closed my eyes and faked sleeping.
POV: Brooklynn
I woke up on the couch, I must have fallen asleep while editing. How late were we up last night? I then realized that I was resting my head on (y/n)'s shoulder. I quickly moved off of him, feeling a blush rise to my face. I turned away from him. I looked outside, the sun was just coming up over the tree line. I looked around for my phone to check the time but I didn't see it so I opened my laptop and saw it was about 6:30.
(y/n) Began to stir and opened his eyes. "Morning Brooklynn."
"Morning," I replied without looking at him.
"Did you sleep well?"
"Yep!" I replied a little loudly. "I'm gonna go take my stuff back to my room."
"Alright, me too, guess I'll see you later."
"Yeah, see ya."
"And (y/n)..." I said turning around with all my stuff. "Thank you. I really appreciate you helping me."
"No problem."
I smiled and walked back to my room.
POV: (y/n)
I grabbed my stuff and headed back to my room. Darius, Kenji, and Ben were still sleeping. I wasn't tired so I put my earbuds back in and went to listen to my playlist but my phone wasn't in my room. I must have left it in the common room. I was too lazy to go get it so I just layed back and hummed the songs instead, letting the dreams about my father and yesterday's events.
TIMESKIP
About an hour later the other guys had left the room and I was still humming when I heard a knock on the open door. I looked up to see Brooklynn who didn't look too pleased.
"Whatcha humming?" She asked
"Light Switch by Charlie Puth," I replied
"Oh! I love that song. But that's not important, someone took my phone."
"What?"
"Someone took it and I have a pretty good idea who took it."
"How do you know that someone took it? Everyone has used your phone. I used it last night to look at UFC news. To be fair I also couldn't find my phone, but I assumed I just left it in the common room."
"See, it's weird that we would misplace our phones when they're basically our whole lives."
"I do other things than content you know?"
"Come on, let's go see if the others have it,"
We walked to the common room and Brooklynn opened the doors and stood there looking like she was ready to go berserk on someone. I stood there awkwardly to the side of her giving the others a look that said 'Run and hide'.
"(y/n), Brooklynn." Yasmina started with a derogatory tone in her voice, "What's new on the internet, Superstars?" Brooklynn had told them all about my YouTube thing last night, and now that she knew that I was also 'famous', Yasmina had decided that she had to be bitchy towards me too.
"We wouldn't know because when I went to get my phone from its charger. It wasn't there! And (y/n)'s went missing too. Someone stole our phones!" Brooklynn said with anger in her voice.
"Brooklynn, who hasn't had your phone?"
"I needed to check the weather last night..." Ben said.
"Dr. Sattler posted a new column on microfossils yesterday..." Darius added.
"The lighting yesterday was too good to miss the selfie opp, but I swear I haven't used it since then." Kenji Finished.
Brooklynn turned and glared at me. I shrugged and gave her an 'I told you so' look.
Brooklynn sighed, shaking her head.
"I... haven't seen it either," Sammy said with a stutter which made me raise an eyebrow.
"Really?" Brooklynn said
"Hey, hey, it's ok! Since we're not kayaking till later, we'll have plenty of time to look for the phone." Darius said, trying to calm the situation down.
"Brooklynn, we probably just dropped them somewhere." I added.
"Oh, I think I know exactly where to look." Brooklynn said walking forward, "I also think whoever took the phones might be trying to hide something that's on them. What do you think, Sammy?"
"Um, what?" Sammy said guiltily.
"What is your deal? Sammy said she didn't touch it!" Yasmina said, standing up and getting in Brooklynn's face.
Me and the three other boys looked at each other, we all knew what was coming.
"Aw shit, here we go," I said.
"Ever think you might have just lost the stupid thing?" Yasmina continued.
"Hmmm. Well, then, let's check her bags and test that theory out." Brooklynn replied, not backing down from her. She began walking towards the rooms but Yasmina stepped in front of her.
"You do not get to go through anyone's stuff, I don't care how famous you think you are!"
"Brooklynn, I did not-" Sammy started.
"Shut up Sammy!" Brooklynn said and whirled on her. "I don't know what you were doing to the sino in that video or why you need to hide it, but-"
Yasmina grabbed Brooklynn's shoulder and turned her around. "Hey! You don't get to talk to her like that! Why don't you shut up about your stupid ass phone or your stupid ass YouTube channel!" Yasmina said.
"Why don't you make me shut up, Bitch." Brooklynn said, getting right in her face.
"Oh, damn," Kenji said, turning to us with a smirk. He was enjoying this way too much.
I realized I was gonna have to break this up before it turned ugly. I stepped in between them pushing them away from each other. "Can everyone just shut the fuck up for a second!"
Everyone looked at me like I was crazy for stepping in between them, which to be fair I was. I may have stared down a velociraptor, but stepping between two teenage girls about to come to blows was probably the most dangerous thing I've ever done.
"Let's all just chill. Here's the deal. We'll all look for the phones around camp. If we don't find them, then we'll search bags, ok?
"Fine." the two girls said at the same time, still glaring at eachother.
"Good now let-" I was cut off by a loud roar in the distance.
"What was that?" Brooklynn asked nervously.
"Um, a T. rex?" Kenji asked
"Mm-mm. I don't think so." Darius said
"Then what sort of dinosaur did it sound like? Friend-ish? Or foe-ish?" asked Ben
We all ran out to the balcony to look but the trees were too tall to see anything.
"Maybe they're moving a new dino from the lab to another enclosure," Darius said
"I bet we could see it from the observation tower," I suggested.
"That would be so cool!" said Darius.
"Wow, great Idea! What are we waiting for?" Sammy said, grabbing Darius by the arm and hurrying everyone else along.
"Hey, we're not done talking about this yet!" Brooklynn said then turned to me, "How can you be so chill about this? She took your phone!"
"We don't know that she took my phone yet. Plus It will be good for you to have some time away from it for a little while." I said.
"Fine." She said and stormed off towards the elevator.
"But, guys, it's Indoor Arts and Crafts Day! We should stay and wait for Dave and Roxie, right, Kenji? (y/n)?" Ben asked
"If you wanna stay here and draw you and your dino-crush, go for it. I'm gonna go see me a T. rex or a girl-fight. Either way. I win. Ka-ching!" Kenji told him extravagantly.
"I hate to say it but he's got a point," I said and followed him.
"Fine, go on! I'll just stay where we're supposed to stay, wait for who we're supposed to wait for, and be right where we're supposed to be." Ben said with confidence, which immediately crumbled when he looked at the T. rex statue, got scared, and said, "Wait! Guys, I'm coming too!" as he ran towards the elevator.
A few minutes later we were outside the observation tower which was unfortunately surrounded by a gate that was locked. Yasmina, Kenji, and Darius were pulling on the door. Like that's gonna do anything, I thought. They eventually gave up.
"It's locked." Stated Kenji.
"Oh really? No shit, sherlock." I said.
"Oh, wow. Guess we can't get in." Ben said, "We should all go back before someone comes along and we get in trouble."
"Wait, where is everybody?" Kenji said.
"Yeah, there's a weird lack of staff today," I said.
"No shit, sherlock," Kenji said, imitating my voice.
"It doesn't sound as smooth when you do it, Kenji," Yasmina said.
"Thanks, Yasmina," Kenji said, irritated.
"Hey, Yasmina, can we call you something shorter like Yaz or something? Yasmina is like the longest name to say." I asked.
Note: I'm freaking tired of typing Yasmina.
"Um, yeah, sure."
"Thank you."
"Anyway, how the hell are we gonna get through this fence?" Kenji asked.
"If we're doing this..." Brooklynn said, pulling out one of the pins that were holding her hair up. " then we might as well do this." she began to pick the lock.
"Ah, I see we have a master of grammar here," I said, making Yaz and the others chuckle.
"Shut up." She said, with a playful smile. "Ta-da!" She said and opened the door.
The others looked at her in surprise.
"What? You didn't see my 'Unboxing Kathmandu" video, 'Hacks For When You Lock Yourself Out Of Your Hotel Room'?" she said with a smirk.
"Last to the top is a rotten egg!" Sammy yelled.
"Later, rotten egg," Yasmina yelled as she ran past us.
The others went after them.
"After you m'lady," I said, pantomiming a tip of the hat to Brooklynn.
"Why thank you, sir." She replied in a posh accent and took off.
We ran up the stairs passing a few of the others on our way to the top. Sammy reached the top first out of breath. She began to complain about the heat going full southern accent. I was breathing heavily but it wasn't that bad. A quick run never hurt no one.
"No... more... stairs!" Exclaimed Kenji, laying down on the top step, panting.
"Sounds like a rotten egg talking." I stated, which made everyone laugh.
"There better be something good," Kenji said with a groan.
Heavy footsteps in the distance brought us to the railing. We looked out over the forest. The footsteps getting closer and closer.
"There's something out there," Brooklynn whispered
"Something big," Darius replied.
We waited with bated breath until a brachiosaur came through the trees, reaching up to eat some leaves.
We all sighed, "It's just a brachiosaurus." Yaz said with relief.
"Ooh! Mystery solved." Ben said standing up, "Guess we should head back now."
"But that doesn't make any sense. Brachiosauruses don't roar like that." Darius said confused, "They're more like... Errrrouerrrr." Darius said, imitating a brachy cry.
Me and Brooklynn giggled at his imitation. "Didn't quite catch that. Uh, one more time?" Kenji asked with a smile.
"Hey! What are you kids doin' outside?" Someone yelled.
We looked down and saw two park staff members yelling at us.
"There's an asset out..." It was hard to hear him from the top of the tower.
"What are they saying?" Darius asked.
"Something about a fucking asset, I don't know," I replied.
"Oh, great! They look mad. I told you we'd get in trouble." Ben said.
"Bro, shut up."
"You're gonna have to speak up!" Kenji yelled down.
Suddenly we looked up as the brachy went down in the forest bellowing in pain and a huge roar echoed through the forest. We all jumped away from the railing in fear.
"What the fuck was that?" I asked.
My question was quickly answered as a huge monster appeared through the trees turning green to blend in with the trees to a pale white. It was bigger than a T. Rex with similar features to one as well as features to a Velociraptor. It had longer arms to beagle to grab and hold down prey and a huge mouth with rows of razor-sharp teeth and some spines going down the back of its neck. It chased one of the men but he couldn't run for long. With a crunch, we all watched as the man was torn apart. It roared in triumph, blood all over its lips and teeth.
"What the fuck is that thing?" I said in shock.
"It got him! I got him!" Ben screamed
"Someone calm Ben down!"
Suddenly Brooklynn gasped, "Dr. Wu's lab. There was a dinosaur. In-"
"Indominus Rex," Sammy said quietly.
"How do you know that name?" Brooklyn asked her.
"Darius?" I asked for some statistics on this thing.
"There's no dinosaur named-" He was cut off by Sammy
"There's no time. We need to leave. Now, now, now! We have to go!" Sammy said frantically.
"Up here is safe, down there isn't," Kenji said, "Besides, this high up, it's not like Whatever-Rex there can even see us."
The Indominus immediately looked up and saw us.
"Safe is a strong word, isn't it, Kenji?" I said
"It sees us!" Ben yelled
Everyone screamed and backed away from the railing. The Indominus ran towards the observation tower, knocking down the fence and using its arms to pull at the base of the tower making the whole thing shake. Everyone stumbled, one or two of us falling over as the Indominus continued to destroy the base of the tower. Sammy was knocked over the railing but Yaz caught her before she could fall and me, Kenji, and Darius helped pull her back over.
Suddenly Darius got an idea "The zip line. Go, go, go!" he shouted.
No one questioned it. We all just ran over. I basically had to drag Ben over to it.
"Ben, I don't give a shit how scared of the zipline you are. Get the fuck on." I said, strapping him into the seat.
Ben wouldn't push off so Kenji gave him a big push, sending him screaming down the zip line. Sammy followed, then Kenji, Brooklynn, and Darius. I strapped Yaz into the chair and then realized it was the last seat.
Shit! Mine broke on the first day!
Suddenly the others all stopped, sparks flying from rollers.
"Shit they're caught by the emergency break!" I said
"What do we do?" Yaz asked
I got an idea, "You're strong right? Like strong enough to catch me?" I asked
"I don't know! Probably!"
"Then catch me!"
"What?"
"You heard me!"
I stepped back and ran towards her building up momentum and jumped into her. She wrapped her arms around me and I did the same as we raced toward the others.
"You better not get any ideas of having a feel!" Yaz said with a blush.
I looked at her in surprise. "Yes Yaz, that's what I'm thinking about while ziplining above the giant dinosaur that wants to eat us!"
We slammed into the others, jostling the loose and sending us towards the landing.
"Holy shit! It worked!" I said.
"You weren't sure it would work?" Yaz exclaimed.
"I was like 90% sure."
Suddenly the Indominus Rex tore off more of the base, finally making the tower collapse. The zipline went slack sending us all flying into the open air. We crashed through the trees landing on something solid and everything went black.
____________________________________________________________________________
*Ding* *Ding* *Ding*
My father lay on the mat, nose broken and bloody. "30-1" They were saying on commentary. I watched, mouth open wide. My hero had fallen. "He put up a good fight but the champ took advantage and Grant's winning streak has ended." The commentators said. I wanted to cry but I held my tears back. I had to be stronger than that. They helped my dad to the back where he was cleaned up. He was left alone in the locker room and I walked up to him. He took out a black, unmarked inhaler and took a deep breath of it.
"What's that?" I asked him.
He looked over his shoulder at me. "Oh, just something to help out your old dad. Your old man ain't no superhero."
"You're my superhero," I said solemnly
"Well, I'm sorry that your hero let you down today." He said looking down.
"You didn't let me down." I said, "you fought well, it's your first time going after the title, you'll get another shot." I came over to him and climbed on his lap.
"Wanna see how to realign a broken nose?" He asked.
"Sure," I replied.
He took his own nose between his fingers and showed me how to realign it, grunting in pain.
"Maybe I'm getting too old for this crap. How old am I now? 38? What do you think kiddo."
"Take a break and recover, I guess. Then bounce back. Adapt. Like you always say 'adapt or die'."
"Heh. I guess you're right kiddo. You know, one day you're gonna meet a beautiful girl as I did with your mother, and she's gonna give you a kid of your own and I can't wait for that day. You know why?"
"Why?"
"Because that's the day you get to experience the joy I get to experience every day being with you."
I smiled at my father and gave him a big hug.
"I love you son."
"I love you too dad."
That was the last match my dad would ever compete in.
____________________________________________________________________________
I woke up with tears in my eyes. My whole body hurt. I looked around and remembered what happened. I wiped off my tears, stood up, and joined the others, including Kenji who had to climb down from a tree he had landed in. I walked to Brooklynn who was holding the back of her head.
"You ok?" I asked.
"Yeah. You?" She replied.
"I'm fine."
A roar echoed through the forest.
"Where the hell is that thing?" Kenji asked.
Everyone looked around in fear of where it might pop out.
"It-It's coming," Ben said, shaking and scooching back towards Kenji.
"Shut the fuck up! It could be anywhere." I hissed.
"The observation tower was that way? Or was it that way? I..." Brooklynn trailed off not knowing what to do.
Everyone was panicking. Darius was looking everywhere for the necklace his father gave him. Sammy was looking terrified and... guilty?
We heard another roar through the trees, closer this time.
"We have to run. Now!" Sammy exclaimed and we took off, running as fast as we could through the trees until we made it back to camp, destroyed... wrecked... demolished... camp. We walked around assessing the damage. It was bad.
"Dave, Roxie, the other workers, they must've all gotten away," Sammy said hopefully.
Ben walked over to an overturned jeep and gasped, "Not all of them."
I came over quickly and turned him away from the scene. The man had been flattened by the car when it flipped.
Yaz found a walkie talkie but it didn't work. Must've been broken in the attack. I thought
"We're on our own," Yaz stated losing hope.
We all looked down, losing hope as well. When I looked up I saw Brooklynn looking very angry as she stared down at Sammy. "Brooklynn," I warned but she ignored me.
"Give me my phone!" She shouted at Sammy storming over to her.
"What?" Sammy said with a guilty smile, moving hair out of her eyes.
"I don't care about you sneaking into Dr. Wu's lab, I don't care about whatever you did with the skin samples you took from the sinoceratops-"
"What?" Yaz said, confused.
"What skin samples?" Darius asked.
"Brooklynn, what are you even talking about?" I said with a groan.
"What were you doing in Dr. Wu's lab?" Kenji asked.
"I don't even care that you stole it now." She continued ignoring us, "All I wanna do is call for help! Where is it?" she said.
Sammy was backing up in fear of Brooklynn's rage. "Uh, I..." I noticed her hand go to her pocket for a moment, "I... I don't know what you're talkin' about!" She stated stepping away from her towards Yaz, me, and the others giving her the numbers game. "Skin samples? Sneaking into labs? You made up some crazy thing in your own dang head!"
"Hey, back off!" Yaz shouted at Brooklynn, "Not everything revolves around you and your phone! It isn't Sammy's fault you lost it!" She and Brooklynn stepped up to each other picking back up right where they left off in the common room.
"Ok we're not doing this shit again. Brooklynn cool it about the phone. Yaz stop trying to bait her into a fight."
"Oh, says Mr. side with the pretty one all the time. You guys are two peas in a self-centered pod." Yaz spat at me.
"You know what Yaz, I'm done with your shit." I said finally snaping and loosing my cool, "Stop acting like me and Brooklynn are such a burden to be around for you. We never did shit to you except being semi-famous. You treat us like shit because you say we're self-centered when in reality you're the one being pretentious and bitchy. You're just mad you had to leave your phone at home!"
"No matter what you think of me, that still gives her no right to yell at her about her god damn phone all the time."
"Would you guys keep it down?! There's a big-" Ben was cut off by Kenji who decided to be an ass hole.
"A big, scary dinosaur? Of course, there's a big, scary dinosaur! There's always a big, scary dinosaur!"
"And you're always a big-mouthed jerk!" Ben yelled back.
"Will you two shut the fuck up? You're not part of this." I said annoyed.
"Give it back!" Brooklynn yelled.
"Back off!" Yaz yelled back.
"Get the fuck out of her face, Yaz!" I warned.
"Fuck off, (y/n)!" Yaz screamed.
"Yeah? Well, at least I don't play with crayons!" Kenji yelled at Ben, continuing their argument.
"Why do you have such a problem with me and (y/n)?" Brooklynn demanded, "I'm trying to get us all out of this mess!"
Note: If you can't tell, I'm trying really hard to come up with more words to describe the way they are talking so I don't type the same thing 50 times.
"I didn't lie to you about it!" Sammy screamed.
"Money's not gonna help any of us!" Ben said, replying to something Kenji said, "No one is getting out of here! We just saw people get eaten! We're alone, we're defenseless... we're dead." he said sitting down and hugging his knees to his chest.
Everyone walked in different directions to cool down, still trying to cope with their situation.
"We're not giving up!" Darius said sternly. We all turned to look at him, "I get it. It's scary. This wasn't how it was supposed to be. Things aren't always gonna go your way. Life is messy and sometimes... things fall apart. Note: Get it? Because that's the name of the episode. But that's okay because when that happens, we pick up the pieces and keep going. And we never give up." We had gathered around him, listening to his speech but it had reminded me of something.
"I'm with you." I said, stepping forward, "My dad used to say something like that. He put it simply 'adapt or die'. There's no way I'm gonna die like a pussy to some oversized chicken."
"What about your necklace?" Brooklynn asked, stepping forward.
"It's not important. I've got the memories right here," he said pointing to his heart
"What are we supposed to do?" Yaz asked
"Easy. We adapt." I said
"We get south to the park," Darius said, nodding in agreement. "We get help. And the only way we'll make it is if we do it together. We're a team or we're nothing at all."
"Or, you know, we don't go back into the jungle," Ben said.
"Or, you could shut the fuck up and come with us instead of waiting here for death on legs to come to you."
"Yeah bro, you wait for the babysitters, but I'm with Darius too," Kenji said, putting an arm around Darius.
"Wait, really?" he asked.
"Dude, there's no way I survived a dinosaur attack-"
He was cut off by a piece of debris almost hitting him.
"Just to be taken out by cheap camp debris. Kenji ain't going out like a pussy neither."
"I agree with him. Let's roll. Y'all coming or what?" I said walking south
"I'm in," Brooklynn said and followed.
"We're in, too," Yaz said, putting an arm around Sammy and they walked after us as well.
"Um, but guys?" Ben stammered. He looked around and sighed, "It's just one dinosaur. It's just one dinosaur. It's just one dinosaur. It's just one dinosaur." He said to himself and ran quickly after us.
I smirked, "Way to get us on the same page, Darius." I said.
He smiled, "Thanks, man." he replied and we walked south with newfound hope.