All was quiet, silent, and still. All the girls could hear was the sound of their own breathing and the gentle lapping of the water against the shore. Then, some forty or fifty feet away, they heard the water churn as something emerged from it. There was the sound of something being dragged across the marshy earth. Ariel looked back at her companions, and she saw the same terrified, uncertain looks on their faces that she knew she must be wearing as well. What do they do? Is the creature leaving to feast on its' seafood dinner? Should they try and get the skiff righted? Would that draw more trouble?
Finally, Ariel swallowed and understood that if someone didn't take control of the situation, the three of them would just stand here quaking in fear until they were all dead. She gathered her composure. "Okay. Let's get the skiff upright and get out of here. It's probably still seaworthy, I don't think Hyneria broke any holes in it."
"R-right."
The girls edged into the water, wincing as the sloshing liquid made noises. They had to act quickly. Penny, Ariel, and Rinoa gripped the skiff and tried to push the end they held up and over to make the boat roll right-side up. With all the sounds of water, they didn't hear one more splash added to the chorus.
They had nearly gotten the skiff onto its' side when Penny saw the dark shape moving towards her in the water. "IT'S HERE!" she screamed, making a break for the shore. Ariel and Rinoa hurriedly followed, as a mouth big enough to swallow a truck tire whole snapped at the air where they had been standing only moments before. The girls quickly aimed their weapons as the creature finally revealed itself...
"SHOOT IT!"
Ariel and Rinoa opened fire, their arrows flying at the huge amphibian, which appeared to be at least 25 feet long. Their arrows were on target... but the creature's skin was slimy and rubbery, and the arrows mostly just glanced off. It's mouth gaped, and it slowly crawled towards them. The girls began backpedaling as the monster approached. It was extremely slow-moving, and anywhere else it would probably be easily escaped from or killed... but on an unfamiliar island with low visibility, things were different. The girls kept away, but they couldn't afford to lose sight of the monster...
As it continued to march forward, a name came to Ariel's mind. This appeared to be a Koolasuchus, a giant amphibian from the Cretaceous Period... but it was larger than it should be. It shouldn't have been much bigger than the Hyneria, but this beast was at least ten feet longer than the believed size of the species. As if this island wasn't insane enough...
Penny fired upon Koolasuchus with her tranq gun, but the needles, like the arrows, struggled to find purchase on the wet, rubbery skin. A few managed to jab the beast, but it didn't react. It continued forward, slowly and steadily dragging itself towards the girls with its' undersized legs. Rinoa fired another arrow and watched it glance off. "Sharp weapons have little effect on thine creature's form!" she exclaimed. "Blunt instruments, we need blunt instruments!"
"Way ahead of you!" Ariel said, snatching up a hefty hand-sized rock, taking aim, and flinging it at the salamander monster. A direct hit, inches above one eye. The beast bellowed, the area where it was struck weeping a trickle of blood. Koolasuchus turned and hauled itself away from the girls, slipping into the water.
"YEAH! Nice shot, Ariel!" Penny cheered.
Ariel smiled in spite of the stress of the situation, nodding and waving for her friends to follow her back to the skiff. They began to follow.
The water exploded as Koolasuchus leapt from it, jaws open wide as it lunged for Rinoa. It was a miss, sort of - she didn't end up in the creature's mouth, but it had managed to land on top of her, and over half a ton of amphibian bowled over the small archer girl. There was a crack and a shriek as Rinoa landed poorly and the heavy creature landed hard on an arm, injuring it badly. Koolasuchus thrashed, but it couldn't get its' mouth around Rinoa in her current position underneath it, so it had to settle for crawling off of her and towards the other two, who were pale as ghosts.
"RINOA?!"
Penny backpedaled a bit, checking her gun. She ejected some of the darts it used as ammunition and gripped them in her hands, then walked backwards until she was swallowed up by the mist. Ariel watched her go in mounting panic as Koolasuchus seemed to forget Penny existed and began internally debating on whether to attack Ariel or finish off Rinoa. The decision was made for it as Rinoa scrabbled upright, holding an arrow in her good arm, and jabbed it downward at Koolasuchus' neck. There would be no glancing blow this time: the arrow went deep, and the beast thrashed in pain. Its' wildly swinging tail caught Rinoa, and she went down again with a cry. Koolasuchus lurched around to face her, opened its' mouth wide, and scooped her up, biting down hard with enormous jaws. Rinoa screamed for help as the amphibian shook her like a hungry crocodile, and Ariel scrambled to provide aid...
Penny ran out of the fog, her tranq darts held high in one hand, and swung down. Like Rinoa, she'd figured out how to hurt the beast with sharp weapons - go melee. All four of the needles in her hand sunk into prehistoric flesh, pumping in the tranquilizer. Koolasuchus dropped Rinoa's limp body and bellowed in pain, taking a few shuffling steps back... and then wheeling on Penny as she tried to back away. Its' jaws sucked up Penny's legs, and as Ariel ran in with arrows in her hands, the beast began to feed.
Screaming a war cry, Ariel jammed her arrows into the back of the Koolasuchus, trying to paralyze it. The first few jabs did nothing but draw blood, and Koolasuchus continued to chomp on Penny. Finally, though, one dual stab with the arrows made the back legs and tail go limp, and Koolasuchus jerked its' head upward and groaned, Penny falling away.
One of her legs was gone.
Ariel took a few quick steps back, looking at her companions in shock. Penny and Rinoa were both unconscious and bleeding heavily. She was untouched by the creature... but she was all alone now. Koolasuchus' muscles still worked from the waist up, and it groaned as it slowly dragged itself to face Ariel, daring her to make a move.
Ariel took a deep breath. There was one way she could win this. In the chaos of Koolasuchus' ambush attacks, she'd neglected her magic, but now was the time to use it. Casting Protect upon herself and Regen on her fallen allies to keep them from bleeding out, Ariel grabbed two more arrows from her quiver and stared down the monster salamander.
Koolasuchus slowly dragged itself forward, pushing its' head up as high as it could, mouth gaping.
Ariel darted forward, hands-first, and Koolasuchus' jaws snapped down onto her arms as she jammed them into its' mouth. She cringed in terror at the sight of her arms vanishing into the beast, but there was no pain - her Protect spell was holding, and the thrust she'd made was complete.
Her arrows had gone deep into the upper jaw of the monster, and had managed to get to the brain. It stared back at her with glassed-over eyes. Koolasuchus had died instantly.
As the jaw went slack, Ariel slowly pulled her arms free. The corpse of Koolasuchus slumped down onto the ground, and the trembling girl looked at her fallen companions. Still no way to get off the island with the skiff still upside-down, but at least she could tend to their wounds... somewhat.
-----
Several quiet minutes passed before Ariel saw the flying object again. This time she was sure it was real. It was coming closer, dropping out of the sky in a slow, controlled manner...
It was one of Tron Bonne's drones, Buzz.
"Oh, thank god, I found her. Can you hear me, Ariel?!" Tron's voice crackled over Buzz's speaker.
"Yes! Yes, I hear you!"
"We're sending help! Stay put, the drone is transmitting a signal. We'll find you!"
"Thank you... but how?"
"Your mom. She saw you and your friends going out on a boat and told me to send an extra eye in the sky to keep tabs on you. Didn't expect all this mist, though."
"Oh, Mom..."
Ariel blinked, her eyes wet with tears.
'She's always so worried about me."
-----
About sixty minutes after Ariel and her fallen friends were picked up by Celestia and whisked to the hospital for treatment, the island had another visitor. No beasts from the past approached them. Instead they withdrew to their various burrows and pools and crevices, hiding away. Using a helicopter to land on the island, the visitor surveyed the damage and inspected the corpse of Koolasuchus before getting back in the helicopter and issuing commands to the pilot, who went into the air, lowered a grabbing arm on a long cable from the bottom of the helicopter, and picked up Koolasuchus.
The helicopter flew away, carrying the dead creature.
"What are you going to do with this thing, anyway?" The pilot asked.
"I thought this was a superior creature... Hmph. Needs more enhancements. We'll expose it to Smog."
"If you keep feeding Smog, I'm worried it'll get out of control."
"Nobody asked you."
"S-sorry."
"Besides... maybe I want it to get out of control. Ever thought of that? When the time is right..."
-----
Well, could be worse. Could be Black Gas.
ReplyDeletePenny got off on the wrong foot.
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