There was a rumble in the air.
A tremendous roar from the heavens above rocked the surface world, echoing into the bleeding soil, between the green foliage, and throughout the emptiness of this sacred valley. I felt it too, a quiet vibration beneath my toes as I stood before the mighty brewing storm yet to come. But no matter how much I trembled at the thought of a rather uncomfortable downpour, my eyes were fixated on a much dire threat: Predators.
I could smell all three of them slithering about in the undergrowth before me. I longed to see them, to snuff them out of range, and out of my life, but their feathery dark scales and tinted flesh proved almost impossible to see.
I knew that they were there, waiting in the shadows. I knew what they were after.
And I knew why.
Those swollen charcoal clouds began to stir up a rather dark-grey complexion, one that would make any quarry rock proud. All that blackness, all that energy, it was almost certain that mother nature was in a fit of rage. Throughout the valley a violent wind came about, pounding against the waves of grassy strands that swished to and fro. It stirred up a storm of its own, tossing about loose dust into the sky and thin soil fragments that had broken free of her confinement. This newborn wind was cold to touch, dampened, and condensed of this dirty soot that plagued my sensitive snout. I could feel the air shift quickly, howling to life as the positioning sky growled, watching intently as a carnivore would to his prey. Only this time, it was a moment quite rare in this era, only magnified by the beauty setting over us all.
I took careful note of the incoming blackness, courtesy of a bolt of lightning in the distance, but once more my eyes returned to the danger before me, to those inconspicuous beasts that reeked of desperation, and hungered for murder. A quick shift of their motions forced me to limp sideways, my frilled skull tilting to the right away as a reflex. Their methods were smart, their tactics unquestionable. I knew that fact by heart, not by mind. Alas, a fight was inevitable, but a death by their hand became my deepest concern. I couldn't afford to lose everything, not while I stood firm tonight.
"Where are you..." I hissed softly, my amber eyes narrowing as I took another pained step back. A powerful boom rolled across the valley, rippling the ground beneath me once more. It was during these short spurts of noise when the predators would change position, forcing me to take a completely new stance. I could hear the clacking of their jaws, the splats of their claws, and their hisses of delight over their newfound delicacy.
I flinched slightly when the rustle of grass came from behind me, and with a slight shift of my weight I spun forest-bound to face my hindquarters.
Nothing was there.
"Show yourself!" I growled louder, tilting my head when the rustles appeared on my right, then jolted left as another came from the side. But, in spite of my warnings, my adversaries didn't seem to acknowledge me as a threat. More of a fresh find in this vast land, ripe for the picking.
Snorting with annoyance, I let out a mocking roar, slamming my good foot down to shake the earth beneath their claws. All at once, all three souls paused, their beady eyes wide and panted breaths falling still. Had they not been warned they would've had the upper hand already. They could've cut me off, attacked upon command, done anything in fact to subdue me. But I knew well, because no sane creature could ever back down from a challenge.
And so, the bravest soul that had stalked me stepped forth into the fading light.
I inhaled sharply as the first cold droplets began to fall, looking down with utter disapproval at the peculiar raptor before me. Peculiar indeed, because he just stood there. The male was drenched in ruffled black feathers from head to toe, with only the scales beneath his eyes and the jutted bone of his snout to retain exposure. His sleek body glimmered like a thousand stars under the dying light, but what lied within his visage was a cold and dark void. He looked desperate.
No, he looked angry.
Not just over my hide, but because of something more. Of something that I didn't know.
The raptor would eye my torn-up underside as if his own hatchling stood there, droplets of saliva oozing down his toothy maw. Just the slight flare of his nostrils and his frozen inaudible stance told me everything I needed to know of his intentions.
Or did it?
A sudden flash of light illuminated the earth, coaxing the ground with four spasming shadows. Once again I flinched, a grunt of concern escaping my maw when I found both raptors, having followed their leader's commands, had indeed cut me off at any chance at escape.
I was alone, once again, to fend for myself. Forced to fight for a life I had just regained. And even now, as the last shockwave of thunder rocked the skies, allowing the rain to finally fall to the surface, I could smell Death's presence, watching me in the shadows, hoping that this next test would be my last.
And to that, I growled at him with my final answer...No.
The raptor nearest to his alpha barked out what appeared to be a command, examining me to the best of his knowledge. He took a second to flare his nostrils, both beady eyes studying my damaged form, then darted forward.
Frightened by his sudden lunge, I launched my head forward, striking his body to the ground by the butt of my head into a fresh puddle of bloody mud. The secondary raptor, shocked by my backlash, took his time to attack, and upon noticing my loss of attention, launched onto my side.
Sharp fangs suddenly snagged into my back, tugging away at the flesh, just enough to outline a piece of myself. All at once I could feel the warmth of my blood beginning to dribble down my scales, escaping it's mortal prison. Every lucky stab at my hide drew more and more of my life away to the bosom of nature's soil. I began to writhe in response, helplessly roaring and yelping aloud against this struggle. But to no avail did that do anything to save me. As his previous mud-caked friend launched for my foot, the raptor above yanked backward, a ripping noise entering the air, followed by an explosion of agony in my back.
I heaved forward, releasing a painful screech, and watched the raptor above tumble down, a piece of bloody meat fresh in his jaws. He took no time engulfing his share, for it was gone just as it had appeared in my sights. The cackling rain only made it worse for the newborn wound, coating it in cold water that sizzled upon touching the warm tissue inside.
In pain, I weakly side-stepped the attacking mud raptor, watching him skid to the left and hiss at me. His red eyes were wild, the primal ecstasy of a hunt already fueling his lust to kill me. Alas, he wasn't wrong. The damage was already done earlier, the crusted blood was enough proof of that giveaway. If anything, any carnivore for that matter would've seen to it that I was dead, just to satisfy their cravings. Indeed, this is what they wanted as well.
A sharp sting soon followed as I came to focus, this time emanating from my tail tip. The vicious monster had his teeth latched tightly onto it, straining to pull away any meat that might serve it's stomach. Though it was easy to knock him away with a quick swipe, the new gash and oozing blood upon the rainwater was a reminder to me that this was real. That dying could very well happen, if I'm not careful.
A shadow fell over me upon the crack of another splinter of light, and I quickly spun around, facing my enemy who darted at my flanks. I heaved once, unsure how to react to this attack, but after a midway toss of my head, one of my horns managed to rupture his ribcage, tearing a new wound on his torso, giving him a taste of his own medicine. The raptor, surprised that I was even able to accomplish this, dropped hard to the ground, yelping as his blood began to mix into the mud. I snarled in reply, bending low and jumped forward, giving him no time to run for cover.
A screech sounded as my skull struck him, his body flailing wildly as he, once more, submerged into the ground, disappearing into the grassy forest of woe. I snorted heavily, a bit prideful and confident despite the limp, now that I've gained the advantage.
Even the greatest of success wasn't long-lived.
Blurs of rain-soaked feathers suddenly rushed up at me, pouncing onto my frill as the sky erupted violently. The raptor's toe claw sank into my snout, and before I could fight back three talons rushed at my eye, smashing into my visage turning my wonderful world into a sea of red. I warbled painfully, shaking my head to try and detach the creature, before yet another stab of pain came from my hip muscle, opening another deep wound courtesy of his friend. Their combined weight dragged me down, and instantly gravity's mighty hold on me became too great.
And I crashed into the ground, hard.
The raptors clicked with joy, continuing to bite and slash, claw and nip to wreak havoc upon my poor body. All I could do was writhe and scream, the stabbings already growing too much for me to bear. And all this whilst the bloody alpha raptor watched from afar, impatiently.
"Grrr... Get off!" I hissed angrily, roaring back as I shook my frill hard. But something had caught my eye, the last raptor, who, after a minute of nothing, slowly started to stroll toward me. His pupils were dilating quickly, darting from left and right as he set his target. I tried to follow his gaze with my good eye, still straining to pull away the other two heavy raptors, before noticing that his attention was focused on my throat. He wanted the kill badly. He longed for it.
That's what made him flawed.
Go ahead, I hissed in my mind, allowing him to see a clearer target, I dare you.
Almost instantly the leader squealed an almighty battle cry, his sprint a mad-dash at my jugular vein. I had a second to act. A second to change it all. Slamming my skull, chin first, into the mud, I violently unbalanced the raptor upon my face, and, while he still hung on for dear life, I used my free paw to angle myself and jerked my frill left bound, right into his very own alpha.
Upon losing his grasp both raptors collided with one another in a muddy explosion - flesh upon flesh, claws upon claws - and together crashed into the earth with a painful cry. The raptor on my tail accidentally slithered off, due to the slippery mixture of blood and water, and with a low bend I struck the raptor by the base of my tail, tossing him head-over-heels into an exposed rock face. His back struck the frame hard, before he too slumped into the void of grass between the ground.
My turn, I huffed, turning to the two downed raptors, my eyes flashing in fury to end their lives. All I could feel, aside from my deepened wounds, was fire. Burning glory, burning rage.
And above all others, immense anger.
I reared up without warning, howling into the darkness of the vicious storm, and stomped down hard, enough that even the grass themselves shook from my might. Rather than the sound of a bone-crunching kill, only mud greeted my claws, and upon careful inspection, the damaged raptor had escaped, but just barely. His eyes were wide with fear as he laid underneath me, cowering in the shadows of my power. Yet, no matter how vicious I had appeared, there was always a part of me that he'd find to be a weakness. And he did. Without a moment to lose, the raptor clamped his jaws down around that terrible exposed wound beneath me.
And tore my underbelly open wide.
"AAH-!"
My beak opened wide in a blood-curdling scream, muffled away by the explosion of thunder above. Alongside the rain that poured down from the heavens, globs of blood suddenly spurted out from inside me, killing all my hopes and dreams of a winnable battle. I gurgled terribly, struggling to cry out into the night, for help, for a healer of some kind.
Nothing arrived.
My body quaked in weakness, my poor visage blurring up as the raptor stumbled away from me, the flesh he had ruptured clenched tightly between his two little jaws like a trophy. I pulled away, losing my sense of balance and stumbled sideways, struggling to find the strength to run, to escape this agonizing nightmare of a battle. And as I limped further away, the raptor grunted to his partner with a sense of pride, in which his alpha took the word of approval to heart, and attacked.
No...
His agility immediately overwhelmed me. Every motion was planned, every turn and plant of his foot was carefully exercised. His comrades licked their chops with excitement, slowly rejoining the battle to feast at my broken stance. This predatory dance made them imperfect, giving them every possible chance to shred my flesh into ribbons.
I had to admit to it, I couldn't keep up.
My lumbering body was a sack of offerings for the beasts, already tormented by the attacks from before. And with the gallons of blood I was already quickly losing, I doubted that I could manage to get the upper hand in time. The turns I made, the rolls I countered, it almost always led to a score by the many fighters. I would blindly swing my frill into empty space, roaring in agitation as my spine and underbelly turned blood-red by the success of his efforts.
And the failure of mine.
My fears were coming into the light. All of them were.
It was at some point that their actions soon began to wear me down. Long before I had the chance to think, or regain myself for that matter, a pair of claws would find an unguarded area to strike. Even though I tried, all three of them found somewhere to strike. Until finally, the monster turned away from my hide completely and began bashing in my stunned face.
I whimpered weakly, backing away as lines of wounds began to appear all over me. Every strike onward knocked me senseless, destroying any thoughts I had, any ideas for that matter. He'd aim for my throat at times in which I'd block, only to be gifted with yet another strike across the face.
I-I can't...I wheezed, spurting out blood through my gaping beak, I can't...fight...on...
A soft groan escaped my maw as stars danced before me, urging me to give into their magic. I was hesitant at first, growling them away to focus on the predators before me. But the more they surfaced, the more I longed to close my eyes.
And give in.
I felt my legs beginning to quiver under the weight of defeat. Even now I couldn't find anything left inside to merely stand upright, let alone make a run for it. I gazed into the bewitched eyes of the lead raptor, into those dark and soulless voids, and whimpered. But as I waited, watching his every movement, a strange voice, not that of my own, soon fluttered in my mind. No maws moved, nothing in fact did. But the voice inside screamed into my mind, loud, demanding, and above all else, angry.
This is for what you did to my family.
The alpha raptor roared at me, swinging around in a circle before his thick tail cracked into my skull, blinding me into darkness. Even through closed eyes I could sense my paws leaving the ground unwillingly, and in one split moment struck the ground with a sickening thump, right before the gleaming eyes of the victorious carnivores.
The raptor placed his alien foot onto my lowered horn, raising his head to roar to the crackling skies that howled in his approval. But I could do nothing at all, nothing to fight back, nothing to rouse me to fight onward. Like a switch, my body had shut down, preparing for the inevitable to happen. Waiting for them to accept their victory.
And feast on my flesh and bone.
I was scared. I wasn't ready to face this confinement again. Of course, I didn't know how it would feel to be eaten alive, but I prayed that it'd be quick. I prayed hard: to the stars, the moon, the broken heavens themselves, that death would come running and take my soul far away.
And so, I listened for him.
And waited.
I could hear the storming weather above me, to the clicks and hisses of my enemies conversing about their wonderful catch, even the sad rumbles of the soaked green grass that had protected me before. I peeled my eyes open slowly, groaning once more and watched the world move around me slowly, looking for something to do in these final moments...
Wait...
My blurry visage suddenly locked onto his leg. More specifically, his foot upon my horn. He was unbalanced. Not even set to fight, and yet, exposed all at once. I still had some strength left inside me, oh I could feel it. Alas, these horns were gifted to me in birth. It would only make sense to use them for their true purpose.
Without much of a warning my head pulled back, quickly loosening the grip of the raptor, and just as planned his leg stumbled down into view.
One heavy growl later I jerked my skull forward and impaled his fleshy muscle, right through the bone and out the other end.
The carnivore screamed, jolting up and down like a hungry hatchling, begging to undo what had been done. But there was nothing to remedy this kind of damage. And with this, I realized that I had doomed him for an eternity. He too had no choice now, unable to do anything but accept a fate that I must grant him.
In spite of all that I had lost I managed to stand up, my underbelly still dripping of warm ooze. The poor raptor, now free of his binding, struck the ground and writhed wildly, fighting his fatal injury by any means necessarily to escape my shadow. He was dead already, I knew that deep down. Perhaps it was time for him to accept it too.
I raised up onto my hind legs, my two front legs swinging in the air, and with one final roar, I gave into gravity.
There was a screech of surprise as my two paws struck the unfortunate slim body of the lead raptor. He only had a second to accept his fate, before his flesh struck the earth.
What followed was the most horrendous sound I've ever heard. The moment his body struck, both paws strangely jerked downward, subsiding the force with a vicious jolt. Out of the silence came what sounded like an egg splattering against rock, the exterior shell shattering into nothingness, exposing the oozing runny liquid of a dead hatchling.
Only, it was no egg.
I felt what had happened. The soft pumps of meat soaked my paws as I stood there, engulfed by absolute fear. Without warning the smell of death immediately swarmed my clouded mind, digging into my lungs with the most rotten stench known to my kind. No longer did I find the energy to continue on with this fight. I think the others believed so as well.
Not while their proud leader laid dead and dismantled before their feet
His skull was caved in deep, a gush of red and green splayed outward from the hollow bone in a streaked line. His jaws had split into two from the mere shock of the slam, teeth splintered on the ground as if it too had given upon his body. Even his lengthy neck had twisted at a degree in which no neck, or any bone for that matter, should ever bend. Where the other paw landed garnered the same effect: crushed bone and toiled meat, far too ruptured to be healed. There was no point in trying anyway: the murderous creature was dead.
Ignoring the sickening sight beneath me, I took a fearless step forward toward the two stunned raptors, a puff of steam escaping my flared nostrils. No words were needed to get them to listen, no signs, no voices, nothing at all. All they needed to do was stare at their deceased leader, then gaze into my eyes, for a sign of mercy.
But all they found was death itself.
The universal word seemed to get the better of the two carnivores. And without much else to consider they dashed away, together, into the darkness, and into the unknown.
'So they do have thought', I grunted internally with both amusement and relief, 'perhaps now they know not to mess with...me...'
Already feeling the effects of my final effort, I looked down at the deceased raptor, noticing one dull eye gazing upward at me, an infinite stare at the monster that I had become. The sight was sickening enough, and only my stomach could lurch in reply. And as I stared, his sentence once again repeated inside me.
This is for what you did to my family.
What did you do to my family...?
His family...
I limped sideways, losing balance as a sleepy sensation overcame me. No matter how hard I tried to fight, it grew stronger and stronger, mixing in with the pain of my wounds and bruises. Immense wounds that I feared may be too broken to be fixed. They were too great to sustain me, too deep to mend on its own.
I needed help. I needed someone...
Anyone...
Please...
I let out a loud whimper as the nausea worsened, the loss of blood destroying my grasp of life. Minutes had passed by before I let out one final grunt of pain, succumbing to the damage. It didn't take long for me to collapse, my ruptured body splayed outward underneath a forested sky.
The last thing I heard were the thumps of a creature approaching from behind me.
Before I fell into the darkness.