We’re being watched.
A man in the far corner of the group screams and his head disappears into the thick grass. I erupt into motion just like everyone else, several alphas running off in whatever random direction they choose, leading the way into the darkness. I pick the largest group of panicked people and run in the complete opposite direction, gritting my teeth when I realize a handful of males run alongside me. With several meters between us, our breaths saw in and out as we sprint as fast as we can through the sharp grass. Blood wells from my arms as the blades slice through me without mercy, but I have nothing to cover them with, so I train my gaze on the path ahead, desperate for a change in scenery.
Between one stride and the next, the head bobbing to my left disappears. I glance to find the beta male gone, the trampled trail behind him ending abruptly. Cursing the height of the grass and my shortness, I push through the ache in my thighs and the burning in my lungs, pouring on more speed.
An alpha with much longer legs reaches the end of the field ahead of my tiny group. He trips over a log, screams, and gurgles the tune of death.
Crimson sprays up around where he fell, but the grass and the log block my view of whatever’s happened. I change my trajectory, shifting to the right and breathing through my fear when a thin beta male almost tramples me. He snarls before his eyes go wide, his higher advantage point offering him a clear view of the gore ahead of us.
A gust of wind bends the grass, dipping the surface like waves on the ocean.
Reptilian eyes stare back at me from a terrifying, hungry face full of teeth and intelligence.
Terror gives my feet wings. I dart to the left and duck, gritting my teeth to hold in my scream as fiery pain streaks across my face, the blades slicing my cheeks, and a massive body catapults over mine.
The thin beta screeches and flails. I push forward, trying to put as much distance between myself and the horrifying creature, searching for somewhere safe.
A tree. I should climb a tree. Being off the ground should protect me from the velociraptors.
Why my brain supplies me with the name of the monsters stalking me through the field, I don’t know. All I can focus on is the nearest climbable tree.
A feminine scream pierces my ears as a beta woman reaches the woods several hundred yards to my right. She jumps and starts scrambling up a trunk.
Instinctively pivoting to the right to avoid the log dripping crimson again, my heel slips in mud, so I tuck my shoulders and roll.
Claws snag on the back of my pant leg as another velociraptor lunges for me. Breathless from fear and exertion, but too stubborn to quit, I pop onto my feet and dart in a new direction. The woman screams and begs as she clings onto a low branch, her body stretched tight as rows of deadly teeth close over her calf.
I gasp for breath, my lungs an inferno as my head throbs with every beat of my heart, nausea roiling through my already tight stomach. A few paces away from the tree I mean to climb, I watch in horror as a gigantic beak closes around the woman’s head. The pterodactyl twists its neck and leaves nothing but a torso behind as it disappears back into the foliage.
Nope. No trees for me.
Pain slices across my back as I dart around the trunk, the predator right behind me half a second away from killing its prey. Blindly diving over a bush with fat leaves, I tuck into a roll but keep falling and falling until finally my butt hits ground and I slide down an impossibly steep incline.
The haunting call of angry beasts follows me as I tumble through vines, rocks, and brush, my entire body throbbing in pain. My descent ends. I lay bruised and exhausted, fighting for breath and staring blindly up at a thick canopy of leaves.
A heavy mass slides down the slope above me.
I struggle to find my feet, rolling one last time before the hill evens out enough to propel me forward. Turning toward the sound of what I hope is a river, I thrash through the underbrush and prepare to vault over a fallen log only to slam my stomach into the bark, shock demanding I stop as my original tormentor blocks my path.
Tilting its head, the raptor watches me freeze in fear. My diaphragm seizes as I realize how close I came to jumping into its jaws.
If a dinosaur could smile, this one would offer me a triumphant grin. A sparkle enters her slitted eyes, and she hunkers down for the final swipe of her claws.
A shadow rises behind her, blocking out what little of the night sky passes through the canopy. It grows and grows, moving without sound, expanding until it stands twice as high as what I thought was my biggest threat. The velociraptor’s yellow speckled eyes narrow as she senses her doom.
Claws as long as my forearm wrap around her throat and stomach, ripping her in two with one savage jerk.
A multi-toned screech bombards me from all directions a millisecond before more dark shapes vault out of the abyss. I drop behind the log and scurry along it as war rages between the pack of velociraptors and the unknown creature. The groundshakes and gut-wrenching snarls ring through my skull as I force my battered body to move, my ribs sending shards of agony through my chest with every breath.
Reaching the end of the log, I scream and roll, barely avoiding being smooshed by a bloody tail. Scrambling to my hands and knees, I crawl to the nearest cover, batting humongous leaves out of my way and pushing myself deeper into the thicket of vines and thorns.
Heat encompasses my ankle and drags me back into the fray. Mud cakes under my fingernails as I scratch at the ground in vain. Massive talons pull me inexorably out of my hiding place and roll me onto my back.
I stare up into slitted pupils surrounded by oblong green and yellow speckled irises, expecting each breath to be my last. With muscles locked in terror, I hold my filthy hands above me as though I might have a chance of warding off such a monstrous beast.
It leans closer, its broad shoulders blocking out the canopy above as the long face, an eerie cross between a raptor and a human, inches toward mine. My gut clenches as a familiar, lascivious gleam sparks within the creature’s eyes, a sudden plea for death rising in my soul.
Delicious pheromones clog my nostrils as a lethal claw strokes my cheek, the outer curve smooth.