Story The Elf and The Black Dragon

[IndoWriter]

(Honestly, I haven't seen any fandom related stories here, and I hope that's allowed. I'd hate to accidentally post stuff I shouldn't be here. :-/)

Rayla thought things were going to good for her. This was supposed to be the greatest time of her life--where she helped Ranaan and the others finally end the bloodline of the human king and maybe start the end of the war. She just needed to prove herself as a capable assassin and do what was necessary if she ever got the chance. She would be hailed as one of the heroes and she could rest easy knowing life would be better for the land of Xadia...

...but then this blasted, pain in the arse dragon came along and tried to eat her several times. It won't go away, it won't stop showing up to attack her and it won't stop being so unbelievably terrifying either.

She just wants the wingless devil to leave her alone.

--Or--

The Indoraptor, still very much alive, is thrust into a world without machines and technology. But he needn't worry; there's more than enough magic and non-humans to confuse him for weeks on end.

 

[IndoWriter]

It was a dark and stormy night.



He couldn't hear any patter or pitter from any water formations falling from the heavens, but he could very clearly feel the infinite assault of the rain on his scales. Given how long he'd been here, it was easy for him to run through various ways of describing the rain or what it made the night look like outside. He could recall several days that began with a dark and stormy night and went on forever or so just to describe the storm itself.


It was raining fairly hard to compensate for the heat of the summer, so hard that it was difficult to see more than a few feet out past the dark shadows and describe anything in perfect detail. He could just imagine seeing tiny rivers and rivulets slithering down the crystal exterior of the mansion to drip from the upper panes of the window. When the constant waterfall fell to the lower panes it created the softest sound above the white noise of the raindrops that fell away from the castle. A never-ending wet splatter against a crystalline base, that sounded like someone pouring water onto a floor made of metal.

The raindrops alone were like static to his restless ears by now, though they would twitch occasionally if thunder boomed just close enough to the mansion. The floor vibrated from the noise and as a result of the air clapping back together. The lightning brightened the room, but it never added color with it's presence. Such was a side effect the rain's soothing down fall--it turned the horribly colorful world around him into a realm of grey and white. It was almost painful to look at, let alone experience.



Pain was not a foreign thing to him. Pain was his entire life--every second of it. The moment he hatched had been a blinding mess of pain and foreign voices ranting about ‘success’ and ‘the future’. That was nothing compared to the hunger pains when those strange scaleless bipeds neglected to feed him for weeks on end, just to study his behavior towards a live goat. The crackles of their poking sticks hurt the most and often sent him into a fit of foamy snarling with a few well placed stabs here and there. He could fully describe the pain of just living in an empty cage, bones cramped and misshapen from having to position himself in such tiny quarters. Many mornings would consist of him trying to crack stress out of his neck without accidentally killing himself.



Being impaled on a skeleton was an entirely different rating for pain, however.



It was downright baffling. He couldn't even begin to wonder how he’d survived a fall onto such a dangerous skull. It already stung too much to breathe past the bone stabbing in one side of his neck and poking out the other. Just the sight of it was confusing to his still young mind; being impaled in two different parts of the body meant certain death. When that maintenance worker tried to change his lightbulb, impalement definitely spelled death for him. Why was this any different?



The pain returned every time he moved, shooting up and down his body. He wished he’d never just passed out when he landed, or at least missed the horns by a couple of feet. It was better than being stuck in a very painful position. The Indoraptor gurgled on a mouthful of blood, which joined the rain in dripping onto the floor. He still didn't die.



In pain, yet curious, the creature carefully placed a foot on the nose horn of the skull, then a little further up. A weak push made him slide up ever so slightly, but it was not enough to free him.



Frustration made him snarl unhappily. He pressed a bit more firmly against the skull and even used one of his hands to help. Slowly but surely, his body lifted itself further up the horns and finally managed to unsheath itself from the sharp tips. A strangled screech came from the Indoraptor when he made a clumsy tumble to the flat ground. Of all the pains he could list, that was probably the worst of them.



He lay motionless for an hour or so, afterwards, content to die of the massive holes in his body. Blood was certainly oozing out of his wounds at an alarming rate, and yet he didn't feel the icy cold grip of shock try to steal his life. He just felt the pain and the blood and the rain. Nothing more.



The Indoraptor whined softly. He got himself up on floors weakly, muscles shaking with strain as he righted himself. That accursed raptor--practically flinging him down upon the horns herself. A low snarl built in the base of his throat, but the hole in his neck made it turn into a sputtering cough. He settled for standing up on his hind legs and gently giving the room a sweep of his eyes and nose. Nothing was different from when he’d last been in this room except for a few new human odors. Otherwise, it was as if he’d been alone here for some time.



He limped his way into the hall with a measured pace, pouring a helping of blood here and there as a result. After a few meters of wandering around the more familiar sections of the mansion like a lost dog, The Indoraptor decided that carrying on after suffering such fatal wounds would be a bad idea for its health. It was night, and he would need to rest to clear its volatile head. He crept his way down, down, down into the lower crevices beneath the mansion and roamed past melty hallways of glass and concrete. There, he found his lonely den waiting for him with a door outstretched to welcome him. He entered the familiar, homely cage and stepped past the human skull inside.



He curled up and slept hard.



--------------------



Rayla blinked herself awake from her thoughts, and saved herself from walking into a tree.



She had a bad habit of thinking a little too much when she was supposed to be working on a singular thing. Even when walking, there was a good chance a few stray thoughts would cause her to walk right off a cliff. But she couldn't stop internally admiring the way the forest looked as she traversed it's many strange corners. It wasn't like the gardens of Xadia, where a plethora of friendly creatures came out to greet you with open paws. Years of fear instilled by the likes of humans made these animals more skittish around anything that remotely resembled a human. Four fingers or not, one could not deny the physical similarities between the two species. Unless you ask Ranaan, who would heartily explain how elves are completely superior.



The Elven girl finally made it to her actual destination, a rock near the center of camp, large enough to sit on for a moment. They had taken two full days to sneak into the forest, and that took 48 hours of walking alone. Going that long without sleep was normal, but not something she liked if it was as random as this. Her body ached everywhere from being in constant motion, and she was forced to hide it so Ranaan didn't accuse her of being too soft for the team. However, she could tell even he was wincing a little, along with maybe two other elves in their little troop. She knew none of them would admit it.



A growl silenced her quiet thought process, and she leapt to her aching feet with daggers unveiled. It didn't take her long to find what caused the growl and she had to suppress a surprised grin. “Er...Ranaan?”



“Hmm.” The stoic elf sighed and gave a glum shrug. “I will admit, none of us have had much to eat during our journey.”



“Finally, you admit it.” An elf grumbled sourly.



“Too bad we didn't bring rations,” Another elf pointed out.



Ranaan gave the elf a disapproving look. “A true Moonshadow Elf can live off the juice from a single Rasberry, for weeks at a time. Besides...I warned you all to eat well before the trip.”



Rayla perked up almost immediately. She had a great idea for exploring more of the forest, if Ranaan gave her permission. “Oh! I could get us a deer to eat! We have our fire spells to discreetly cook et. N'human would catch onto tha', no matter how close they are!”



He looked skeptical of her offer, but the elves that spoke before agreed verbally. She waited patiently for his reaction, watching his falling expression. He rolled his eyes, but smirked all the same. “If you truly wish to move around so much, be my guest Rayla.”



She sprinted off before he could change his mind, grinning from pointy ear to pointy ear.




--------------------



It was sunlight that awoke him, like the lights from those pestering scientists that always studied him in his cage and wrote things down on their little wooden tablet things. It was from a notable hole in the wall above him, peculiarly high all things considered, which allowed steady rays of sunlight to pierce through all three eyelids and hurt his retina. Snarling in discomfort, The Indoraptor slowly got on all fours and reflexively leaned back on his heels to stretch is long spine. After yawning wide enough to crack the joints in his jaws, he turned to examine the hole shaped wound near his flank.



Only, there was no wound.



He gave a short bark of surprise and sniffed the strangely healed scar a few times, nostrils filled with a greatly aged scent of blood. The beast was greatly puzzled by the smell of time that had passed from his wounds--he’d never slept five days in a row. In fact, he wasn’t quite sure if anything he’d ever heard of ever slept that long. His young yet intelligent mind was swimming with questions he couldn’t answer, and a truth that spawned them all. Not only had he survived very fatal injuries, but he also healed from those injuries in the span of a week.



A week. He’d been sleeping for a week, and it only felt like he’d dozed a few minutes. How many sunrises had he slept through, before this one awakened him? How many days had it been since he last ate that elevator full of humans, crunching their bones to a pulp and slurping down their brain matter from their skulls? Why had he not died?



Sighing, he resolved to make up answers as soon as he’d found something to fill his snarling belly--he must have some luck finding a decent meal out beyond the mansion. Perhaps once he caught something, he would come back and eat in his newly deserted home. The beast nodded to himself, having caught the tactic from watching humans, and started to step out of his cage...only to stop. His fiery eyes slowly glanced back at the dusty skull looking alone in a corner of the cage. For some reason, he didn't like the idea of leaving it here--it was the only thing he had a positive relationship with after all. He was heading out into a bizarre world that he knew about; maybe his toy could help steel his nerves, should they erupt?



Now carrying the clinking skull in the tips of his black claws, the Indoraptor waltzed out of the cage and down a hall that he knew would lead to a way up and out. Energetic steps propelled him forward; a great contrast to the tired gait he displayed earlier thanks to his grave wounds. Confidentially, he looked around his glass surroundings and paused when he noticed himself in a mirror. Indeed, he looked much better than before. The Indoraptor’s lips stretched with a pleased smile, before he started off walking again. Nanoseconds later, the Indoraptor shot back in front of the mirror glass and gaped.



Flesh was covering his teeth.



He pressed his snout against the glass to see better; he actually had... lips . Thin flaps of flesh had grown from just above his sharp teeth and were blocking his pearly whites from view. With a surprised look in his eyes, the dinosaur flexed his newly grown flesh and examined the dark gums surrounding his teeth. Now this was definitely deserving of an answer. Now he looked all too similar to that raptor that nearly killed him.



The Indoraptor grumbled incessant things at the back of his throat, made baritone by his own hoarse vocal chords. That cur of a demon almost killed him and attacked him with those annoyingly sharp claws and teeth. If she was still out there, alive and well, he would kill her. He would kill her and eat her and carry her skull around too.



The Indoraptor made his way up to the lowest floor of the mansion, where brown oak floors and walls greeted him. But as he pawed down the hallways like a great black wolf, his sensitive ears detected something. He paused in midstep while his sickle claws tapped the floor nervously; he had heard voices. Yes, human voices just beyond the corner of the hallway.



“You hear that, Kurt?”



A rough, yet feminine sounding voice made the Indoraptor’s jaw twitch spastically. The tapping claws became frequent. “Is someone knocking? What’s that noise?”



“Someone must still be here.” A confused male voice affirmed quietly. He could hear the human pull something out, then a metallic click--obviously the sound of a gun cocking. “Police! Come out and--Holy shi--!!!”



The Indoraptor often wondered why humans reacted that way to his appearance; their eyes wide and their mouths open in a locked scream of fear. Did they think that shrieking would save them? It was a reasonless reaction in his opinion and rather than allow the male the luxury of screaming, he quickly bit down on his head. A satisfying pop sent a fresh iron taste on his tongue and the blue-clad male went limp. The dinosaur ignored the body and whirled to face a barrage of gunfire.



The woman, with red hair that reminded him of that female on the roof, fired with frightening precision against his bulletproof hide. He roared in mock pain the more she fired off and pretended to fall over in death throes, twitching until he was certain that she had run entirely out of bullets. Then he kept himself perfectly still as though he were dead and his eyes only had slits to see through. He could see the shaken woman approaching with quivering limbs, her wide eyes taking in his gangly form with disgust and fear. She lowered the gun--perhaps to reload it.



He slapped the air beneath her chin and snorted as his claws met their mark.



The gurgling human succumbed to death in seconds, and the Indoraptor was treated to the first decent snack in about a week’s time. His jaws tore into the bodies with some mild difficulty (they were wearing strange armor of sorts), tearing out great chunks of intestines and reveling in the things he was able to drink from their corpses. Something about the taste of humans was addictive, especially compared to the unalive meat sections he was fed repeatedly--which were cold and tasteless when they slithered down his gullet. The Indoraptor ripped his head up after snatching up the meat of the female in his jaws. Hmm, rubbery.



With a cackling snarl, the beast rose from the dismantled bodies and stomped off to find the entryway to the giant mansion. He cocked his head as he approached the giant doors, feeling some strange emotion in his chest as he began to pull the handle to open the door.



“ Chrak .” He chirped in a low tone.



Was this uncertainty, the emotions of those fiendish humans? What an odd feeling. It was actually making him pause--making him stop to consider his options. Options that he didn't have much of, to be perfectly honest with himself; staying here would eventually lead him to run out of good food sources. He chirped again and forced himself out into the glaring light of the sun. He blinked and snarled at the giant yellow sphere. Such a bright thing. He didn't like the sun.



The dinosaur wisely turned his sights away from the sun, instead moving down the porcelain stairs and sniffing at the steel car with blue and red lights. It smelled of his recent meals; their sweat and odor mixing with the cold metal. They must have come here in this strange metal contraption, seeking...something. He did not care what.



He looked up, using his great neck to look beyond the gravel courtyard to the forest in the distance. It faded in gradually, first as tall grass and then as a few sparse bushes here and there and finally as towering masses of oak. Trees--they were everywhere, as far as his eagle eyesight could see from his position. The forest loomed high with a shadowy background and dark branches, crooked as they tried reached out to him. Distant noises echoed from beyond the foreboding scene, sounds not dissimilar to the noises he'd heard the night of his escape. The whole mansion smelled of other beasts, including that raptor; he could only assume that they'd all entered the forest some time ago. This also gave him pause.



What compelled them to seek freedom from this place? It was the only environment The Indoraptor had ever known, save for that place with all the bright lights and humans crowded around him. The cold feeling of a cell had become him so much that it stung ever so slightly to be standing in warm soil, with a hot light boring down on him. Perhaps these other animals, like that accursed Raptor, were born in some forest like this and had grown used to living in an environment with so many...variables. The Indoraptor chittered to himself, claws tapping the skull in his grip.



With cautious steps, he plodded forward and disappeared amongst the trees. He would come to sniff at each tower of bark that he passed, big or small, until his nose had become bored of the scent of plants. When he wasn't attempting to sniff at trees, he was fighting off the assault of flies that had grown attracted to the human blood on his muzzle. His lips twitched back in an annoyed snarl while he shook his head--why were these tiny things so persistant on buzzing around his jaws, mindlessly lapping the red liquid staining his lips?The predator bounded forward in a loping run,outpacing the insects and giving himself a much needed rest from his pursuers.



About ten minutes of deep wandering into the forest, he came across a very pungent smell in the air. The Indoraptor cocked his head as the smell hit his nostrils with each puff of his lungs. It was bizarre; a strange urine odor, mixed with dirt. He chittered and stomped off in the direction of the smell, soon coming into a light clearing. In the middle sat a fairly large rodent-like creature with a stout body, stubby legs and a small head. It's body was covered in almost entirely black fur, save for the two white stripes running down its back and its very fluffy tail, which was mostly white. The creature was digging its paws into the earth for something until the dinosaur plodded into view, which caused it's fur to raise in alarm. The scaly beast watched in awe as the small creature raised its tail high in the air, and then backed up towards him with it. The Indoraptor wouldn't have guessed what this meant in time.



A yellow musk suddenly sprayed out from glands beneath the thing's tail, hitting his snout and nostrils in a great cloud. The black beast barked in outrage and alarm at the horrible smell that now clogged his nostrils, lips peeling back in disgust. He slapped the skunk aside with a clawed hand, barely caring as it crunched into a nearby tree or how the human skull fell from his grip. He had to get this horrible smell out of his nose! It was like the musk had stained his face with the horrible scent. He had to get it off, to smell something else.



Ignoring the dead rodent, he picked up the skull and galloped off into a random direction to let the wind waft away most of the residue on his face, then stopped to rub his snout into the ground. The smell was still there, but he would be able to tolerate it and look for other scents as well.



He looked up from his position and noticed he was at the very edge of a large clearing. His eyes swiftly roamed over a field of very tall grass but stayed locked on a large thing in the distance--a large thing that made him snort in surprise and confusion. It looked so strange to him--a four legged thing with its appendages so long that it was nearly as tall as The Indoraptor, despite its head being bent low to the ground. Brownish black fur covered all of its body, some with great patches missing and some parts looking dirtier than others. Flies buzzed incessantly around its hindquarters, but their droning could not drown out the noise of wet chewing. When it's head raised up behind the cover of tall grass, The Indoraptor marveled at the sight of a fat snout and a fairly stout head that connected to it. Aside from unintelligent little eyes and startled ears, he saw that the beast had strange horns protruding from its head at odd angles. They didn't look as sharp as the Triceratops skull that nearly killed him, but they were intimidatingly big.



They stared at each other for a moment; him blinking and it drooling through a mouth full of grass.



Just when he was beginning to think they'd be like that for a while, the hair on the back of the thing's neck stood on end and it started to circle him. The dinosaur frowned as it drew near in it's movements and then, defying logic, it flung a hoof at his snout. A sideways hit made him snarl, both pained and confused by the actions of the beast. The furry creature tried to slap at him with both forelegs, striking blows to his ribs with its blunt hooves. In retaliation, the Indoraptor caught the forelegs in his jaws and crunched down. The furry beas beast snorted and pulled itself free soon after, but at the cost of it's own shins. With his skull toy rolling on the ground, The Indoraptor was free to hiss and dart forward at the unprotected neck of his foe. A satisfying pop had it go limp almost instantly, and the Indoraptor let the body of the moose fall to the ground.



The furry beast was still alive as he began to chew his way through its throat, at least until the eyes glazed over when his teeth scissored through the vertebrae. He picked up the neatly severed head in his hands and examined the teeth. Different than his, like those humans. But these had no canines. Just flat yellow pieces connected to gums and a uselessly rough tongue. The Indoraptor began to nibble at meat left at the neck when he thought he felt something beneath his feet. But it was nothing he could be certain of, so he kept snipping off meaty pieces.



The ground vibrated again. Then again. Then again.




He looked up sharply when he heard the crackle of tree branches, and his eyes widened in sudden terror. He had never seen any creature bigger than he was and therefore never thought that there might be something bigger out beyond the walls. The beast he saw lumbering out from the dark of the forest was an intimidating monster of immense size; a behemoth at least twenty feet tall and much longer in length. It's arms were tiny but it's massive jaws were not, made even bigger by the amount of teeth lining its gums. It halted on two legs in a stalking position and finally ended its thunderous assault on the earth. Black pupils dilated in the direction of the Indoraptor and an unhappy growl vibrated the air itself.



The Indoraptor warbled nervously and stepped back.



The Tyrannosaurus barked and raced towards him, its footsteps causing the earth to shake like rolling thunder. With a hiss of surprise, he sprang up and darted backwards to escape the menace that was all too close behind and starting to gain distance with each massive stride. He galloped forward on all fours and constantly tested the strength of his apeish arms by launching himself over the grassy floor. The giant beast lumbered along like a jogging bear chasing after a deer with a limp--drool falling from the generous lengths of her teeth. The monster ignored the carcass left behind in favor of chasing the threat with the familiar scent of a past foe. He could see in those orange, flaming eyes--he knew the beast would not stop chasing him until he was good and dead.



The Indoraptor sprinted with the aid of those powerful kind legs, whipping past winds at speeds he would probably never know or have ways of knowing. It wasn't long before his lungs began to cry and shrivel, begging for a slower gait so that they could gulp down some air. But to slow down meant the rex would persist longer and kill him. He had to keep running.



He lost his footing on a short hill and promptly the price by rolling head first down between a pair of thick trees. He rolled onto all fours and prepared to dash off again, eyes flickering to the mammoth creature on his tail. He bolted off and--



Where was the creature, anyhow?

"Zuh."



The Indoraptor padded to a halt and suddenly took notice of the fact that his certain death was gone, with no trace of footsteps or even a scent of follow. He sniffed at the air again, and then once more just make sure that was right. When he did this, he was quick to realize that the missing Tyrannosaur was not the only strange thing to happen just now. The sky was different-- the sun was starting to set now, as opposed to the morning light it had been when he first woke up. The forest was different too. The trees seemed...more flexible than they last appeared, more brightly colored green than dark moss. Scents of animals had changed greatly too--he now scented things that he was certain wouldn't have existed in the forest without him knowing. Perhaps that hill fall was higher than he expected.



“ Hrek . Chah .”



The Indoraptor clapped its jaws together noisily and decided to investigate it's buzzard surroundings--starting with the smells that registered the highest with it. He prowled to his left and was mildly pleased to find that--despite the hot sun blazing down on him with fierce intensity--the grass was soft like cushions beneath his padded feet. There was an abundant lack of insects as well, no flies to buzz around his jaws in a pestering manner. There was the occasional call of an animal in the trees, but it was nothing he found bothersome.



His tongue slithered out when he parted his jaws, flickering once before resting in his mouth again. A nice, warm heat signature about four yards to his right made his stomach growl with new life. Since he hadn't had the opportunity to devour that moose, he would instead settle for catching something new. He set the human skull down in the grass and began to creep towards the source of heat. Soon he found himself gazing from a large patch of bushes, red eyes squinting at a scene in the distance.



A deer--or a doe to be precise-- looked ready to bolt away from something in front of it, judging from the cautious angle that it's legs were locked in. It’s head was curiously leaning towards something bipedal and he found himself sneering--humans. How had this one come to travel so far into the forest? He gazed at the four fingered hand it stretched out to touch the doe with, knowing in his heart that he would swat aside the deer and bite that feminine hand off. Then he would swallow her whole, kicking and screaming. His hind legs bunched up, preparing to spring forth in a flurry of muscle movement…



-------------------

Rayla carefully knelt down in front of the skittish doe, leaning forward to give it an affectionate scratch beneath her chin. She grinned the more it relaxed, the more it nuzzled her hand. The Elven girl cooed gently as she appreciated the warmth of its furry texture, running her fingers along the all too delicate jaw line. "Aw. Ma team is hungreh. But I don't think you'd be big enough for the job, wee one." The doe curiously tilted its head at her as spoke, gazing up with liquid orbs of dark brown innocence. There was so much of it in this creature--in all the creatures of this forest. How such innocence could thrive in the presence of great evil was beyond even the greatest minds.



She pouted. Did humans ever appreciate nature, the way Elves did? Did humans ever stop to think of the things they consumed in pursuit of their dark magics? No, she was certain they did not. The way they acted was clear sign of recklessness in order to achieve more dangerous power. She would love the chance to see a human try to get up close to a doe like this--an innocent creature like this would smell their vileness from a mile away. They'd clear an entire section of a forest just to keep away from--

The doe was gone. It took her ten seconds to realize that it had vanished in a blur of black and red. It took Rayla five seconds to realize something warm had been sprayed on her face. She ran a few fingers over her face and stared intently at the dark red substance on her fingertips. What was this? It looked...like blood? Crunching and slurping noises drew her attention upward.



A pair of dilated pupils in the center of bloodshot eyes stared down at her and crushed what remained of the doe in a single bite.

 

[IndoWriter]

PAGE 2

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Moonshadow Elves were not supposed to show fear, ever. To do so--to even have fear in the first place, was a sign of severe disrespect to their cause.



Rayla knew this because she had been trained very well in the specific customs of this military clan, and how they dealt with any signs of fear among their ranks. Light offenses of fear were often dealt with being put on disgruntling duties and the bigger offenses would have one placed in a restrictive containment. Then you'd be put right next to the thing you fear the most, given that it's physical until you had eventually overcome your anxiety. She had heard stories of Elves being disciplined through pits of red-back scorpions and venomous spiders, or hung over a nice lake of M'oa constrictors. She was never sure if any of the stories were true, but she would hate be tied up anywhere near the likes of...this.



This beast--This Dragon.



Her eyes widened to size of dinner plates as she stared up,up,up at the towering monster. It's scales were black as night--maybe even darker--and reflected no light from the shining sun. It covered every inch of its twelve foot tall body except for a solitary speckled line running down its sides, colored a dark yellow. The black claws caused chilling goosebumps to pebble her skin; she'd never seen any creature with appendages so pointed or so long. They were practically curved swords, the lot of them--and those sickle claws on the feet looked like they could split a hair. It's apeish arms twitched spastically at times, almost scraping the claws against each other like twiddling thumbs. A tail, a foot longer than its own body, swayed left and right not unlike the slither of a snake.



She scrambled back as it crunched again and lifted it's head in jerking motions to swallow. The head of the doe slowly slid down its throat, eyes glazed with a permanent look of pain and terror. With more crocodilian head bobs, a large bulge was soon sliding down its gullet. Blood dripped down onto her legs when it's head finally began to lower, jaws opening and closing sporadically. Crimson liquid seeped from it's lips and mixed with a clear saliva on the way out. It had jagged teeth-- far too many of them to count-- hidden behind it’s obsidian lips.



The worst part was staring into The Dragon's eyes, those bizarrely wide orbs. It's slitted pupils were dilated to black pinpricks in the middle of red orange spheres. It's bloodthirsty gaze didn't just stare into her soul--it climbed in and snatched it with a strong grip. Her body felt permanently locked in the hold of its eyes, like a hypnotized mouse in the sights of a serpent. There was no hint of mercy within it’s gaze, just a hungry glint as it sized her up.



Rayla didn't know what to think, or what to do. Attacking it would be an undoubtedly terrible decision. She'd heard stories of human knights going to fight dragons lesser than The King of Dragons...but they hadn't been stories with happy endings. No, the knights in the tales usually ended up as burned crisps or even a pile of ash blowing away in the breath of the dragon. The less fortunate knights were mangled in the most gruesome ways and had their bones used for nesting or toothpicks. The young elf didn't fancy either of those endings, but still hadn't come up with a plan of attack or escape.



At least, not until it roared.



It's jaws snapped open in milliseconds to utter a roar that sounded much worse than what she expected a dragon roar to sound like. A dragon roar should be intimidating but also heroic in a sense, like a primordial battle cry of an ancient beast. But this Dragon had no roar--it was a scream of death from another world, not meant to be heard by the likes of a mortal. It sounded like an entire herd of pigs were being tortured and butchered in the worst way possible--shrieking at a pitch that hurt her sensitive ears. Yet there was a baritone edge accompanying the scream, like the howl of a panther in the night. However one may describe it's terrible wail, it was this sound that finally spurred her into an instinctive action.



Running.



Rayla shot up from the ground and bolted into the tree tops, forcing herself to ignore the rumbling bark of surprise behind her. Her nimble feet propelled her from tree branch to tree branch like a spry dancer, pushing her forward with speeds she didn't think she possessed. Wind made her eyes blur with liquid, but it was helpful for her panicking lungs. Hopefully the height advantage would allow her to get far enough away from it.



Branches snapped noisily behind her, and some cracked with echoing intensity. She spared a glance behind her to reveal a horrifying sight: the dragon was racing over the branches she'd crossed. It scrabbled in a rabid manner across the wooden platforms and used its claws to hook into the side of the tree trunks it passed. It's tongue lolled from its jaws like a dog chasing a ball, and that comparison made her shudder all the more. Her thoughts flashed back to the mangled doe, the dead glaze in its eyes and the crunching noises. Once it caught up to her, she would be joining that deer in the belly of the beast.



No! Don't think like tha’, Rayla! She told herself mentally, but still stared at the gaining creature as she ran. Just gah’ta get to th’ camp! Just a few more--



She tripped over her own foot and fell face first into the ground below, caking half her face with mud. Rayla rolled to a controlled stop and got to her feet in seconds. She wiped the mud from her eye and looked for the black dragon...but she didn't see anything. Empty space sat where she last saw it, excluding a few falling leaves.



She whirled around to face the source of a heavy thud and leaned back just in time to avoid a bite by the beast. It tried to swipe her legs out from under her but she was fast enough to jump and avoid a crippling blow. With an angered hiss, the dragon pounced at her and she was barely quick enough to roll beneath it. Instinct made her unsheath her blades, slashing it across it's belly before she stood up again. She was only mildly surprised to find that she hadn't made a mark--the stories did say that a dragon’s hide was indestructible. It didn't mean she couldn’t keep trying to dissuade it...somehow.



“Beh-CHAK. gEH.”



Rayla wrinkled her nose. The noises came from its jaws like bird chatters, if birds had baritone vocal chords and teeth like razors. It began to circle her like a starved Rentha Tiger, keeping low to the ground and ready to pounce. She got a better look at the beast from the side and didn’t enjoy what she saw. It’s back was hunched thanks to it’s head keeping low to the ground, but even it’s low stance had it’s back standing six feet above her head. To say she was afraid would be a grave understatement, but she had to keep from showing it. The Elf girl turned in opposition to where it turned, blades raised in a gesture she hoped was threatening. It didn't seem threatened. It was just circling and hissing like an angry cobra, quills rattling.



“Hhhhhhhhhahk. Fnec. Chumf.” The dragon suddenly paused and faced her, gurgling noisily. A liquid sound began to build in the back of it's throat and its jaws opened slowly the more it hacked. “Skreei. Flugh! Klugh!”



Rayla was even more confused than before. What was wrong with the creature? It looked like it was about to throw up--or maybe it was choking on something. She took a step back, wondering if she could find a spot to run for. There! A tree with a an opening just wide enough for her to squeeze into. Her nervous gaze swapped to the scrawny dragon. It wasn't doing anything to warn her of an impending attack, just occasionally jerking it's head up and hissing.



Sphlat!



Just when she started to squint closer, a wet slap made itself known against her collarbone and on part of her shoulder. She looked down and gasped with disgust at the black substance that she saw--the dragon had spit on her! How disgusting! Rayla grimaced as she wiped the stuff off quickly, but noticed something odd in a few seconds. Her finger, the exposed skin her suit didn't cover on her arms; it was all tingling as though she'd received a mild electric shock. Her skin was turning a bright pink where the spit touched her, an ugly shade of irritation. No. This wasn't spit. It wasn't--



It was almost too fast to make sense of--she should have been more prepared. The moment she looked up to stare at the dragon was the moment she sealed her doom. A fluid blur hit her square in her right eye and a little in the left, bringing with it a pain she had never experienced before. She yelped as a ferocious fire consumed both eyes in a burning grip, forcing her to blink and rub at her eyes furiously. The pain intensified with each rub and soon it felt like red hot daggers were stabbing repeatedly into her eyeballs. Her blades fell from her hands just so she could try to keep rubbing them--she had to do something to get rid of the pain, anything! It was unbearable! Nothing mattered more than getting rid of it by now!



“Augh! G-Gah,” The Elf Girl clawed away sparse amounts of venom and hot tears, falling to her knees in her desperate attempt. She blinked to try and clear her gaze and see again, but only flashing spots of light were visible to her. Was she blind?! No, she didn't want to be blind! Why was this happening to her? Why did--



The ground vibrated when something began to circle around her. That dragon-- the devil himself-- made a hoarse cawing noise that sounded like cackling. It might as well have actually been laughing-- it had her in a very vulnerable position at the moment. Her heart rate rose at the thought of not being able to see it coming, and not being able to defend herself from it.



Then her surroundings became entirely silent.



Her breath hitched in her throat, almost instinctively making her go quiet so she could listen for anything--anything at all. Nothing happened for the longest time and no sound could be heard. A part of her wondered if she had gone deaf as well.



Rayla screamed. A sudden force slapped her sideways and introduced three large whips of searing pain in her side. Her body rolled to a halt against what felt like a tree trunk, almost bending her ribs with the impact. A frightened groan escaped her as she tried to roll onto her knees and hands. A thousand searing needles bit down on her calf with excruciating intensity and yanked, flipping the shrieking girl through the air once more. She landed roughly on the ground, bending her nose in a way that shouldn't be bent on a fist-sized rock. Warmth trickled from her nostrils as the thing chortled. But this time it did not give her a chance to recover.



A crushing weight thrust itself on her back, forcing her breath out of her in a wheeze. Try as she might push up from the ground, it did nothing to move the foot pressing her down, let alone to move period. She grimaced as a sharp point tapped her suit hard along her spine, almost testing for the most painful spot to stab into. Steamy breath wafted over the back of her neck and snaked around her horns, filling her nose with a rotting stench. The dragon rumbled triumphantly above her and tapped its sickle claw harder than before. She couldn't stop the pained whimper from coming out if she wanted to.



“Rayla?!”



Ranaan? Oh, thank Xadia.



The Dragon barked directly above her and she cringed as it's hot tongue caressed her face, leaving behind a trail of stinging slime. Ranaan sounded too far away from her to be of any help, even if he could see them. Perhaps this was where and how she would die: mauled to death by a dragon. She never thought it would be like this; she expected a valiant death alongside her allies. Not...being torn up food for a dragon.



Then something bizarre happened. Air whooshed past her head and then a smaller figure skidded to a halt beside her, followed by several more footsteps. “Rayla! Rayla, are you alright? What happened?”



Rayla blinked at the voice beside her--the familiar presence beside her. She tried to speak but found her voice was clogged with a painful lump.



“...D-dragon.”



“What?”



“S-Saw a d-dragon.”



-----------------------------



The Indoraptor raked his claws down the side of a tree, growling it's frustrations to the heavens.



He shouldn’t have been so playful with his food. The chase had gone well, even if she displayed bizzare leg strength in the trees. Her weapons had been useless and...his newfound venom appeared to work wonders. He just had to go to and toss her round for amusement! He should have ended it and carried her off to enjoy her tasty form in private. Now he had lost his lunch.



And it wasn’t just his loss of food, but a more personal vendetta that he had created with that young female. He craved the scent of that one--he lusted for the taste of her blood in his jaws after licking her scrumptious face. It was different from the skin of humans, sweeter and tangier in so many ways. Even the appearance was addictively different from the likes of humans; what with her decadent horns and her tempting pale flesh. If he could just get his jaws around her graceful throat, her body would fit so nicely in his belly.



He grumbled as he peered out from the bushes again at the gathering of the non-human, who tended to his prey in her feeble state. He had to admit that he had been greatly surprised by the venom that spurted out from his mouth, from glands beneath his tongue. He'd never done that before and had never even seen those holes in the mirror. Still, he was not complaining about his newfound skill--it would be very useful for hunting larger prey when the time came. He knew he would eventually encounter another moose or even have to fight that large animal that chased him here.



“Let's return to camp. I have medical supplies and balms that should heal her wounds and clear her sight.” One of the non-humans remarked to the one he assumed was the Alpha. “And whatever is out there might return soon,”



The Alpha nodded with a grim expression and soon he and his non-humans were carrying off his prize to who knows where. The Indoraptor chirped sadly as he watched her be carried off, his jaws overflowing with a fresh amount of drool. Alas, he would not dwell over the thought of her for too long--he would distract himself to keep from doing anything...brash. He snarled to himself to vent his frustrations, and noticed a particular noise in his throat. The dinosaur created the snarl with a lighter pitch, and then tried again with an even lighter pitch than before.



“...A-Augh!”



He breathed.



“Augh!”



That sounded…



“Augh!”



That sounded just like the pained cries of that female he attacked! He rubbed his throat in confusion, trying to make sense of his ability to perfectly imitate the noises. He was becoming more and more unhappy with the lack of explanation over his newfound abilities and he was uncertain why he was so grumpy now. His curiosity had grown since his near death experience, if seemed. His claws scraped over the human skull with thoughtfulness.



The Indoraptor raised his head skyward and inhaled a lung's worth of air to determine what to do next. Above the smell of the non-humans, his senses gathered another scent that didn't seem quite normal in this forest. He chattered noisily and stomped off in the smelly direction to investigate, traveling through dense wooded areas and even a few clearings as well. He galloped on all fours past towering masses of bark, admired the further darkening skies and slowly but surely made his way to the smell. It was not a particularly pleasant odor, but there were traces of tasty things involved with it. Perhaps actual humans? They often had more than one odd scent to them. There was also a distinct feeling he could detect in the distance--a high source of warmth the likes of which he had never felt before. He would never know that the cavities in his skull had alerted him to such heat, but he probably wouldn't care for such information regardless.”



When he paused at the edge of a medium sized hill, he looked down to a bizarre display. There was a large campfire sitting in the midst of a clearing, surrounded by bloated figures sitting on logs. The Indoraptor watched without a sound as he examined the creatures closer. While their bodies were indeed meaty, their arms and legs seemed grotesquely long--even more apeish than his own limbs. Like Chimps socializing, they each poked into the fire with a large stick and grumbled to themselves things he couldn't quite hear. They were a green so dark that he thought they were black, with skin as rough looking as sandpaper and small pointy ears on their stout heads. From what he could see, they had beady eyes and a giant mouth of tiny yet sharp teeth.



One of the creatures wiped along a jagged dagger with a dirty cloth, snot oozing from it's large nostrils. “An’ then he guts him, just like that. Says his flesh cooked pretty good with Banshee oil, but ya gotta marinate it.”



He glanced at another creature. as he spoke up.”Elf with Banshee oil? Seriously? Everybody knows an elf would be better with Equjack peppercorn.”



“Not everybody sees Elves, let alone gets a chance to eat ‘em.”



“We'll have a chance if we tell the king about the one I almost nabbed. They catch em and give em all to us as a reward.”



Perhaps they would have said more on the matter if he hadn't interrupted in a sudden, uncoordinated attack--rushing down at top speed and leaping upon them all with outstretched claws. Suffice to say, the odd creatures were highly surprised at the big black beast tearing through some of their frail bodies like paper but were apparently not the type of prey that preferred to run in such situations. A few quickly scooped up sharp objects in their hands and made to stab him with the likes of swords, spears and pointed maces. He grunted as their weaponry uselessly scraped over his pebbled skin, causing little more than an itchy irritation to spring up here and there. He used his tail to whip a trio of them aside and then swiped at one that was far too close, splitting his stomach open to reveal gristly intestines.



The Indoraptor began to pounce on another when one of them grabbed something from the corner of his eye and shouted: “Lux!”



An explosive flash of light knocked him sideways and sent his massive body sprawling away from the campfire. When he'd finally rolled to a halt and regained his senses, the Indorpator snarled at the fiendish creature that had blasted him back. He curiously gnarred as he saw what weapon the creature had used; it appeared to be a glass ball of some sort, containing a very bright energy within it's clear casing. This was the source of heat he'd sensed before, and even now it's raw energy was baffling to him. Not to mention troubling, if it could send him sprawling for a few paces. He shrieked at the creature holding the ball of yellow energy and huffed when it only glared at him.



“It’s a damn dragon! There ain't supposed to be dragons outside of Xadia!” He regarded the Indoraptor with unkind eyes and a sneer. “Ugh. For a dragon, he's the ugliest son of a--”



The Indoraptor had hacked up that black fluid by that point, hitting the creature square in his eyes and sending him into a screaming panic, one that escalated when the black beast bit off the arm holding the glowing sphere. After some difficulty swallowing the ball along with the arm, the dinosaur lept upon the unharmed bodies of the others and tore them open with the aid of his hungry maw. At some points, one of the squealing creatures would escape his snapping teeth for a short distance, only his claws to hook their spines and drag them right back to him. In under three minutes he had gathered their motionless corpses into a pile to rest upon.



The amount of bloodflow threatened the campfire with extinction, but it somehow went on despite the liquids surging to drown it. A warm feeling began to emanate from his belly anyhow, most likely the result of swallowing that sphere whole earlier. As he licked blood from his claws and began to pick which body to desecrate first, he wondered just what that ball was to begin with. Would it be fatal to him?



He hoped not. It tasted nice and spicy going down.



----------------------



“Ssssss.” Rayla hissed between her teeth and tried her best not to scream. Her nose, set back into place, only continued to bleed. “Donae touch it like tha’!”



The Elf dressing her wounds payed her no attention, continuing to apply the healing balm where she saw fit. Squirming would do no good for spreading it around, but she'd already been warned that multiple times so there was no sense in telling her to lie still. Although, the placement of the balm wasn't the only reason she needed to stay still; her wounds were the width of a strand of hair, but could open up with more ovements. Three very thin streaks of red were noticeable across the girl's pale abdomen, one long enough to stretch from the corner of her belly button to the edge of her hip. “You need to relax, Rayla. You won't heal by squirming around like this.”



“Ah wusna squirming! It's not like I can just fahget all about the pain and just pretend nothing happened.” The Elven girl pouted to herself. “This is just belter. Pure belter.”



Another elf rolled his eyes at the words she spoke. “I didn't take you for the type to cry over wounds, Rayla.”



Rayla gave him a look that she hoped conveyed that she would fight him if she weren't having her wounds dressed. In fact, she briefly considered shooting up right then and there. “Es nah ordinary wounds, ya bampot. I tol'joo--A giant dragon up from nowhere came and swiped me like that.”



Her healer sighed. “It's a good thing it didn't try too hard, whatever it was. This dragon could have cleaved you in half and taken your foot off with that bite.”



Ranaan opened one eye from his meditating stance. “We're still having trouble believing that a dragon was responsible for this.”



She growled at him, pointing at the wounds being tended to. “ Really? Y'cannae deny this! Ya think I'd just give mahself three lashes here?!”



Runaan winced slightly at her accusations, but managed to keep his face straight otherwise “I don't deny that you were attacked, Rayla. But you were blinded. Perhaps it was a bear that you didn't see.”



“I was blinded after th’--Augh! Fecking ballheid,” She bit her tongue instinctively for a moment after, as part of well engraved manners for using sailor language. Remembering who she was in the company of, she ignored the sharp pains and continued. “I didn't go blind until after I got a good look at th’ bastart. He...spat somethin’...awful in mah eyes and then went ta work.”



“Well why did he leave before we arrived? He could have easily carried you off or fought us all if it were a true dragon.”



“I dunno! Maybe it doesn't want to attack the rest of you.”



Ranaan looked away in deep thought, as intensely as he meditated. Then he looked back to her with a questioning gaze. “The dragon is angry at you, then. I believe you must have done something to invoke it's ire.”



The Elf addressing her wounds, Raina, finished bandaging her abdomen and handed her the top half of her suit again. “What were you doing before it attacked you?”



Rayla stared at him incredulously, but the working of fear also worked into her expression. It was as good an explanation as any and offered a reasonable thought as to why it kept its distance from the others when they approached. She wasn't sure what she might have done to piss off the dragon so much but, much to her displeasure, she eventually came up with an answer. “I...I was pettin’ a small doe before he came along and ate it. You...don't suppose…”



With a mildly sympathetic shrug, her leader sighed through his nostrils. “He must have thought you were stealing his prey. It put you on his most hated list, so to speak. Aside from our combined goal to end the war, it seems you gained a more personal goal.” He explained. “Finding a way to apologize to this supposed dragon to dissuade it from trying to kill you.”



The skeptic elf smirked at her. “Better hope he doesn't come for you tonight.”



Then the night was split open with an inhuman shriek.



The elves were instantly on their feet, Rayla included, weapons poised to attack the slightest sign of moment. Rayla slowly but surely managed to put her suit back on, then found Ranaan's cautious gaze. “That’s the’ sound tha’ black devil made.”



Raina looked around as if she might see the dragon waiting for her to notice him. “Ranaan, that was in the direction that I ran into that goblin.”



The youngest assassin winced from the pain of her dressed wounds but managed to stand tall and alert. “You ran into a goblin?”



“Yes. I took a look around the perimeter of our territory, just as you did. I suppose we both ran into bad luck,” She responded with a despondent grimace and pointed to something on her face. Rayla was not sure how he missed the small cut extending from the corner of her lip, but she felt bad for not noticing it before. “ We were both surprised to see each, but he was the one with the weapon and the one who reacted quicker. I shouldn't have been surprised.”



“We make mistakes to grow stronger. You will have your revenge in good time.” Ranaan went silent to listen for any more sounds, then finally spoke up after a tense minute or two. “Let's investigate the noise. Carry your weapons, but do not attack unless I give the order to do so. Understood?” Rayla nodded with the rest of them. “Good. Now let's go.”



Under the darkness of the night and the power of the full moon, the Elves moved much quicker across the dark tree branches than they normally would in the day. Rayla felt relieved and less stressed as she admired the change in her skin tone from light pink to a dark grey. Her muscles moved with greater strength than ever before, allowing her body to shoot across the span of several trees with a single bound. The other elves had more experience with this newfound strength; Rayla had to move fast to keep up with them at the pace they traveled.



In time, they finally reached their destination and slowed to a stoic halt in the trees. Rayla stopped in between Raina and Ranaan, already preparing herself for an unpleasant sight just by the looks on their faces. No amount of preparation could have stopped her from feeling sick to her stomach at the scene she witnessed.



Whatever goblin or goblins that had been encountered, they were all dead now. No two goblin bodies were ever alike; one could be entirely disembodied while another could be missing all its limbs and a third could have a caved in rib cage. Blood and gory bits were scattered all around the trashed campsite, and it all glinted in the dimly lit campfire. Rayla shuddered as she detected a few eyeballs and ears in the light of the dying flames. She shuddered again when she saw, atop a pile of shredded corpses, the cause of so much bloody destruction.



What scared her was how casual it looked, sitting on that nest of flesh and bone with it's scales soaked in red. His rawboned body was relaxed like a hen roosting, with only its powerful neck, jaws and arms at work. It's hands held a goblin limb up to a maw full of scissor ing teeth; gnawing away feverishly until the meat had been stripped and it was simply chewing on a scarlet bone.



“...T-Tha's him,” Rayla confirmed with a breath more than a whisper.



The Dragon looked up with a chittering remark, eyes flicking to their hiding spot. Rayla wasn't sure if it knew they were there in the trees, but after a while, the beast went back to chewing on the bone. Ranaan ignored the sound of the bone snapping under the pressure of its jaws. “They must have attacked the dragon, foolish goblins.”



“Good riddance to them,” Raina frowned grimly at the sight, but there was a glint of satisfaction there as well.



The elf that had teased her earlier nodded at the sight of the dinosaur. “Ranaan, the dragon has slain our enemies….and possibly saved us from being exposed before we could carry out our mission. Perhaps we should ask it to help us to end the war.”



Rayla looked at him sharply, then turned her horrified gaze to her leader. Even if the dragon agreed to the offer--which she strongly doubted by the way--she wasn't sure if she could trust a demon so bloodthirsty and vicious in it's actions. Maybe Ranaan thought the same about the great black dragon, or perhaps he had made a decision based off of Rayla's uneasy expression. In either case, he shook his head. “No. Solitary dragons are not known for joining sides. To ask for help would earn a dismissal, or even invite our own deaths at his claws.”



Rayla quickly added. “Perhaps it's best we leave now, aye?”



When he nodded, the other elves instantly fled the area and Rayla followed close behind them. However, she paused to look back because of some horrible urge and witnessed another unpleasant sight. The dragon was standing tall atop the pile of bodies with a skull held up in it's claws like a crude sock puppet.



It smiled at her, a grin far too wide and toothy.



She shivered and rushed to catch up with the others.



--------------------------



The Indoraptor was starting to enjoy this hunting game.



He traveled as much of the woods as he desired since the massacre of those ugly creatures, testing his strength against that of larger creatures in the forest and learning from his victorious battles. He'd dismembered large wooly carnivores, multicolored feline creatures and even herbivorous quadrupeds as large as the toothy beast that chased him to this strange land. He killed them all and feasted on their still breathing forms, growing a fondness for the taste of hot blood on his tongue.



But most importantly, he was enjoying that non-human girl. At least part of his days were spent stalking her from afar and waiting for an opportunity to attack her (which never came despite his hopefulness). He would wait in the bushes, or some high perch in a tree and watch her from that position. It was almost painful how his claws twitched with longing and how his jaws ached for her, lusted for her body in his bite. Still, he'd gladly take the internal torture if only to watch her more. The more he followed her around secretly, the more appetizing and downright delectable this...Rayla appeared to be.



He had hung around long enough to find that Rayla was her apparent name--the other non-humans kept calling her that and she called them different names in return. He didn’t care much about anything beyond that. They always had one of their own watching late at night for any signs of danger, so it didn't leave him an opportunity to get closer lt Rayla let alone eat her...Until his most recent night when the non-human serving as a guard fell asleep. Perfect.



The Indoraptor slithered his way between sleeping bodies and followed his tongue to the ambrosial girl he desired. He found Rayla in a strange sleeping position on top of a thick, twisted tree root. Her arms were folded behind her head and one of her legs dangled off the tree root. A calm, neutral expression was on her face and he became aware that the heat of the forest caused a light amount of perspiration on the non-humans. With nary a sound, he crept up to her side and nudged her dangling leg softly with his snout as a test. Rayla must have been a deep sleeper because she gave no reaction to this.

Like a kitten examining its new toy, so did the Indoraptor examine the girl. She had a protective suit on but it did not stop him from sniffing and nudging parts of her body for knowledge. Some areas were toned and muscular and other spots were softer, fleshier. He was often confused by humans and their differences in terms of gender--The Alpha of their group had a muscular pectoral region that he was sure would feel as hard as a rock but females always had soft torsos--extra flesh for some reason. And he didn't even want to start on their facial markings. The Alpha had two markings across the bridge of his nose and his cheeks. Rayla only sported markings on her cheeks. And what were their horns for? He'd never once seen--

Rayla twitched ever so slightly as his snout flushed warm air over her neck. An inhale gathered a particularly tasty aroma and investigating gave him the source. The way her protective skins were designed left her underarms and part of her arms exposed to the elements. His tongue snaked out slowly and flicked at some skin on her arm, just a little bit. Spicy, salty flavor exploded over his tongue at that small little and he whined at being unable to compare her extravagant taste to anything else.His tongue lapped more boldly at her armpit, scooping out more and more juicy flavors with each lick. The Indoraptor only paused when she gave a sleepy giggle, then another when he continued to lick there. He smiled as she smiled; how ironic of her to be laughing so close to her own death.

Speaking of which, he was beginning to have seconds thoughts about eating this delicate apple, at least right now. As gratifying as it would be to tear out her throat or show her her own intestines, he knew it wouldn't be as satisfying as when she was awake. Right now she would have that pumping heart, those whimpering struggles to live. No, he couldn't kill her in this state, but he would savour her flesh in good time.



His claw tenderly grasped a lock of her silky hair, then mockingly stroked along her cheek.



Then it was gone, along with a predator with brewing plans.