Triceratops spun around, pressing her side against her companion to cover their flank. Ankylosaurus swung his tail high above them, signaling that he was ready to smash anything that got close. As he swayed, tail flicking, she stamped her front foot, horns pointed dead ahead, hind legs crouched and ready to charge.
A dakotaraptor slunk out from behind a tree, mostly feathers and beak, its large brown feathery plume of a tail sticking out almost three times as long as it was tall. Its eyes scanned the two as its head swung back and forth, snakelike and cunning. It clearly didn’t know what to make of the mismatched pair, but it also wasn’t scared enough to call the whole thing off.
It pranced, its eight terrible razor-sharp claws digging into the earth, trying to distract them. Neither of them was buying it. They knew there were several others out in the forest, waiting, ready to dive in and tear them apart. The dakotaraptor put its tail back, fluffing it up to make it look bigger.
And then it screeched a blood-curdling call, sounding the attack.
Four other dakotaraptors rushed out of the foliage at once, feathers fanned out, slack jaws of dagger teeth wide open to tear their prey apart.
Triceratops reacted, charging full speed at the nearest raptor.
Her horn tore through it like teeth through a leaf, puncturing right through its white-feathered chest, her momentum picking it up off the ground and carrying it thirty meters or so. She slowed down, whipping her head to slam the raptor into a thick tree, scraping the corpse from her horn, letting the bloody feathered lump fall limp to the ground.
Two raptors descended straight upon Ankylosaurus, the first smashed instantly to bloody, broken pulp from above by a single swing of his tail, the second getting in close enough to clamp its fangs down on one of his rock-hard armor plates.
Triceratops wheeled around to charge the one biting Ankylosaurus. She brayed, loud and angry, sounding the charge.
The raptor looked up from its failed bite just as she took her first steps.
Ankylosaurus swung around, batting him to the side. He looked up, saw Triceratops barreling toward him, and hopped quickly out of the way.
The raptor scrambled to its feet, managing to evade the horns but not the charge—Triceratops’s considerable bulk trampled him into the mud, shattering bones, crushing his spine.
The other two raptors stopped mid-charge, suddenly finding their numbers even, but the odds far from it.
Ankylosaurus lashed his tail back and forth angrily into the earth. Triceratops spun around, taking her place beside him, once more rearing back to charge.
On the ground, the trampled raptor whimpered, crying for help, its spine shattered, body bent in half. The other two raptors took careful steps backward.
And then the forest cowered beneath the tumultuous roar of Hell.
Everything stopped.
Everyone listened.
No one dared move a muscle.
The THUMP, THUMP, THUMP, THUMP of a tyrannosaurus rex, slowly stomping its way through the woods seemed to come from everywhere at once. But the rhythm of its steps was somehow off. This wasn’t a towering predator looking for lunch; it was one of them. One of the dead.
Triceratops pissed uncontrollably. She recognized the footfalls. She’d seen this thing before. Even before it emerged through the trees she knew who and what it was.
One Eye was back.
The shambling mess of a beast knocked over trees and trampled bushes, the deep blood red of its scaly skin flashing through the green foliage.
The dakotaraptors backed warily toward Triceratops and Ankylosaurus, forgetting that just a moment before they were trying to make a meal out of these two. There was safety in numbers, and all things were dinner to a T. rex. So terrified was everyone that even Triceratops and Ankylosaurus had forgotten their enmity by the time the four had clustered together in a tight group.
The beast surveyed the scene with its one good eye, then slowly shambled over to the mewling injured raptor. It lowered its monstrous head and snapped up the broken thing in a single bite, swallowing it whole. The T. rex then turned its attention back to the four remaining creatures.
The raptors exchanged glances with each other before trading looks with Triceratops and Ankylosaurus. None of them was quite sure what to do.
Then the lead raptor plumed out its feathers and squawked, stamping its clawed feet in the mud. The other raptor responded by running off, coming around on the other side of the T. rex. The leader looked back at Triceratops and nodded, hoping she understood.
She did.
The other raptor charged One Eye from behind, letting out a long, aggressive squeal. One Eye turned, lumbering around, just as the raptor immediately juked, veering off into the bushes. Then the lead raptor advanced, squawking, digging chunks of earth out of the ground with its taloned feet in a bizarre, distracting dance. Again, One Eye trundled around, tipping slightly off-balance.
Triceratops saw her opening and charged with all her might.
One Eye looked down, jaw widening for a bite.
It was one moment too late.
Triceratops’s horns tore through rancid flesh, the blow toppling the monster over onto its side, her momentum carrying her well past him into the forest.
Both raptors leapt immediately atop it, digging their prodigious talons into its flesh.
One Eye bucked, knocking the two dakotaraptors onto their backs. Triceratops continued in a semicircle around a tight cluster of trees, trying to find a path back to the tyrannosaur. Ankylosaurus advanced, thwacking his tail.
One Eye staggered to his feet, unaware of the half-dozen fresh gashes in its side. Ankylosaurus smashed his tail into its side, knocking it over once more, shattering its rib cage, and spraying decaying meat everywhere.
The beast howled, but not in pain.
It was oblivious to the pain, already rising to its feet again.
The raptors danced around it in a circle, raising a ruckus, trying to keep it distracted from the two larger, more powerful dinosaurs.
One Eye lurched forward. One of the raptors charged him, then danced back. The tyrannosaur lunged, missing. The raptor rushed forward again, letting out a ka-ka-ka-ka-ka-ka-kaw as she did. And again One Eye snapped at her, missing. Then the raptor charged a third time, and One Eye’s jaws snapped shut right on cue, cutting the raptor in two at the waist.
The T. rex threw its head back to swallow the top half of the raptor while the other half still twitched and danced nervously, blood spurting. The lead raptor, now alone and outnumbered on all fronts, sprinted off into the woods, leaving Triceratops and Ankylosaurus to fend for themselves.
Triceratops charged.
Ankylosaurus swung his club.
One Eye lurched forward, snapping at Ankylosaurus.
The club knocked One Eye’s legs out from under him the moment Triceratops slammed into him.
The tyrannosaur toppled to the ground with a tremendous thud. But as it did, it craned its neck forward, biting down on Ankylosaurus, its daggerlike fangs piercing through his armored hide.
Ankylosaurus let out a terrible bray, the pain of the bite causing him to seize up and jerk away. One Eye, however, would not let go of his prize, and tore away what flesh remained holding Ankylosaurus’s side together.
Triceratops lowered her head and charged, screaming.
Her horns shattered One Eye’s skull and shot through to the other side, piercing his one good eye, cleaving his head from his neck.
One Eye was dead. For good this time.
Crumpled nearby in a pile of leaves, Ankylosaurus brayed in pain. He was bleeding out, in too much agony to move. His tail twitched, tears welled up in his eyes.
Triceratops slid One Eye’s head from her horns, then trotted over to her friend’s side.
She nuzzled his head. He nuzzled her back weakly, and made a soft, affectionate bray.
Triceratops tried to nudge him to his feet, but he was growing weaker by the moment.
She was
going to be alone again.
Suddenly the forest came alive with the sound of chittering.
Triceratops looked up, recognizing it instantly. Leptoceratops. They’d followed them from the lake.
She turned around, placing herself between Ankylosaurus and the approaching horde of diminutive monsters. She wasn’t going to leave Ankylosaurus alone; she wasn’t going to allow him to die that way. No, this was where she was going to make her last stand.
Her foot patted the ground, sounding her charge.
She lowered her head, waiting for them to come into view.
The forest crunched and snapped and chittered with angry life.
Triceratops took a deep breath.
Then the earth rumbled like thunder, trembling, shaking loose like the whole world was coming apart at the seams. It was as if the earth had been struck again by the spirits in the sky.
The leptoceratops cleared the distant foliage only to be met by a charging herd of anykylosauruses. Tails thwacked and whacked and wailed into the ground, smashing some leptoceratops to bits in single swings while sending others deep into the woods. The chittering stopped, replaced by the screams of sudden death.
The undead brachychampsa emerged from a bush, its teeth snapping at a nearby ankylosaurus, three tails crashing down on it in quick succession, pulping it almost as quickly as it had appeared.
Triceratops let out her breath.
It had all happened so quickly.
She raised her head a little, suspicious of the ankylosauruses, unsure if they were alive or dead.
The lead bull wheeled around, approaching her, tail high in the air. Triceratops backed up, placing herself squarely between Ankylosaurus and the herd. The new bull stepped around her, checking on Ankylosaurus.
She knew what that meant and turned, nudging him once more.
She nudged him again.
He wouldn’t wake up.
The bull approached, nudging with his own nose. Then he looked down at the wound, smelling it. His head jerked back, nostrils flared.
In a flash his tail came down, crushing Ankylosaurus’s skull. He wasn’t going to let him come back as one of those things. Then he nuzzled Ankylosaurus with the top of his head before walking past, allowing another to take his place.
One by one each ankylosaurus walked up to their fallen cousin, nudging his belly with the top of their heads, mourning silently, then walking slowly away, a great sadness in their eyes. The procession moved quickly, and as the last one paid its respects, the herd soundlessly plodded off into the forest. Then they stopped. And one by one they turned. And each ankylosaurus gazed back upon Triceratops, waiting to see if she would follow.
She knew what that meant—Triceratops had found her new herd.
She snorted, stamping a foot in the dirt. Then she trotted up alongside them, joining the herd on their long trek across what remained of the valley in hopes of finding a safe place to sleep for the night. And despite how bizarre her world had become, for the first time in days, Triceratops felt at home.
Jake and Willy at the End of the World
“What do you reckon it’ll be like?” asked Willy, after taking a sloshing pull from a sweating longneck. His thumb fiddled lightly with the tattered end of the label, bottle dangling precariously over the end of the plastic armrest of his lawn chair.
“What?” asked Jake, his half-drained beer perched atop the crease between his chest and his enormous potbelly.
“You know. The end.”
“I reckon it’ll be like anything else. A complete surprise.”
“No, I mean, do you think there’ll be anything at all? Like a heaven?”
“I hope so. But then, if there is, we might have some explaining to do.”
Willy nodded. “How many you calling?”
“Three.”
“Only three?”
“Yep,” said Jake before taking another sip.
“Why only three?”
“Because you’re a shit shot, Willy.”
“No, we’re talking about you.”
“I am talking about me.”
“Well, why only three then?”
“’Cause I reckon I ain’t gonna get but the three shots off before they take me out. And I reckon I’m gonna hit everything I aim at. So three. It’s math.”
Willy scowled. “That ain’t no math.”
“The hell it ain’t.”
“It ain’t like you sat here and worked out the time in your head like you were Stephen Hawkings or something. Like some Robocop fella, all mapping out trajectories in your head.”
“Who the hell is Stephen Hawkings?” asked Jake.
“Smart feller. Don’t you have cable?”
“Yeah, I got cable.”
“And you ain’t never heard of Stephen Hawkings?” asked Willy.
“What channel was he on?”
“Most of ’em, I reckon.”
“Was he on ESPN?” asked Jake.
“Naw, he wasn’t on ESPN.”
“Then I ain’t never heard of him.”
“You’da liked him. Sat around in a chair all day. Figured out a way to get the chair to do all the talking for him. Married three times.”
“Good ole boy?” asked Jake.
“Close as you can get without being born here, I reckon,” said Willy.
“What was his thing?”
“His thing?”
“What was he famous for?”
“Black holes and aliens.”
Jake gave Willy a fierce side-eye. “You’re shittin’ me.”
“Nope.”
“Like in the movies?”
“Yep. He was like that guy that the good guy goes to who tells him everything.”
“A scientist,” said Jake.
“Yeah.”
“But, like, for real? Like the guys who found the comet?”
Willy nodded, taking another sip. “Yep.”
“Yeah, it wasn’t like that at all. I just reckon I can hit three.”
“You know how it works, right?” asked Willy. “If you bid too low and go over, you lose.”
“I know how it works, Jake.”
“Good, ’cause I just wanna make sure. I don’t want to hear you screaming about how it ain’t fair ’cause you didn’t know the rules.”
“I ain’t gonna be screaming.”
“You ain’t?”
“Not about that,” said Jake, brow furrowed.
“Well, all right then. Three.”
“How many you putting down?”
“Seven,” said Willy.
“You ain’t hittin’ seven.”
“I’m calling seven.”
“You ain’t hittin’ seven.”
“I’m hittin’ seven.”
“I’ll say it again.”
“You don’t have to say it again.”
“How in the hell do you reckon you’re gonna hit seven?”
Willy stroked the barrel of the Mossberg 500 Tactical edition leaning against his plastic deck chair. “Well, these here are shotguns. Loaded with buckshot. You don’t have to be good to hit that many.”
“You couldn’t hit the wall over yonder if you pointed straight at it and sawed that barrel all the way off. You ain’t hittin’ seven.”
“I think you undervalue my abilities, Jake.”
“I think you just wrote the title to your life story, Willy.”
“Nah. That ain’t the title of the book. It’s more like the title of the song about the book.”
“You think?”
“Yeah.”
“Like in a ‘hell yeah, Hank Williams Jr.’ sort of way?” asked Jake.
“More like a Toby Keith sorta way.”
“So like it’s a lot of talk about kicking ass, but then you end up all ‘You guys go ahead, I’ll stay here and write songs about how awesome you are.’ Kick-ass. America. Yeah. That sort of way?”
“Yeah. Like that. It’s a metaphor,” said Willy.
Jake pucke
red his lips, narrowing his eyes. “A what?”
“What the hell did you have cable for if you weren’t watchin’ it?”
“I was watchin’ it.”
“But you ain’t never learned what a metaphor was?”
“TV ain’t for schoolin’.”
“That’s your problem,” said Willy. “You ain’t never wanted to improve yourself.”
“The hell I didn’t. A lot of good your mesofore—”
“Metaphor.”
“Okay, metaphor is gonna do when that door busts down.”
“I’m taking seven,” said Willy.
“The hell you are,” said Jake.
“I’m doin’ it.”
“What the hell is a metaphor, anyhow?”
“It’s like a simile, but without the like.”
“It’s like you’re speaking Spanish, but my lawn ain’t mowed and my leaves ain’t blown.”
Willy polished off the last of his beer, chucked the bottle aside, and pulled another from the cooler between their chairs. He popped the bottle cap off with his teeth, spat it across the room with a ting, and took another swig. “A simile. It’s where you compare two things. Like, if I was to say this cheap-ass beer you bought is like your ex-wife, Cheryl. It’ll do in a pinch, but it sure don’t go down easy and you spend most of your time thinkin’ that maybe if you’d spent a little more time lookin’, you’d have found something better.”
“The beer ain’t that bad.”
“It’s not good beer, Jake.”
“And that’s the title of my life story. So what the fuck is a metaphor then?”
“It’s just like that, but you don’t say it’s like that. You just kinda allude to it.”
“What does that mean?”
“It means some smart fella made a lot of money naming the same shit two different things.”
“That’s always the way, ain’t it?” asked Jake.
“Yep. So, you reckon we’ll know any of them?”
“Who?”
“You know. Them.”
“I reckon we’ll know a few,” said Jake. “It ain’t that big a town. And the news says it’s an awfully big mob of ’em.”
“It just don’t make no sense. Why spend your last few hours on earth breaking shit and killing people when you can be kicking back and drinking a beer?”
We Are Where the Nightmares Go and Other Stories Page 10
