The Raptor Squad heard the dull whispers of the other species that remained far from their cage speak of the future, of things that might-should happen soon, in riddle like hard questions they hardly understood themselves.
Blue hated the words. They always said she would betray her pack, become a Beta to one of the stick like beings that feared and fed them as gods. So she started to hate the male stick being who taught them things and rewarded them as pack when they obeyed and had been with them since egg cracking day.
Charlie crowed about the end, delighted to go down in the Hunt by the way of Fire. Their life would not be short, and that was all they could ask for. Their Alpha was good to them, even with his click language and his loud-sleep-log.
Echo would trust Their Alpha to the end, even as the sharp-blunt-fire would rain down on them because of it. Their Alpha wouldn't be the cause. It just couldn't be so. He was a being born without claws.
Delta would become prey to the mutt-hunter after turning once, twice. For a while they sulked, but it would be so, and Delta accepted that. Their Alpha would give the order, and they all would obey the defenseless male stick being to the death. It was their way.
If they stayed up late enough into the night, Moss would rise above the water and resonate with howling laughter and new parts of the future they would make it into. Of the biggest kill yet for them, that would be lured to the water's edge by the last Raptor and the only Rex. Of the bloody stick beings who would survive the sky-hunt, the mutt-hunter, the trampling. Of the woman in white who avoided them even when she had to see them for whatever reason, of the way she'd bring the red flash to life and lead on to the mutt-hunter to begin Parting.
Blue was the one who most often stayed up to have chance to hear them, not wanting the twisted versions the other species gave.
Rex was often silent, unless questioned. Their speech was not even as good as the plant-munchers, and the arms useless. But they had skill, and did not care for words of the future that would only make sense the themselves after it happened. Perhaps it was being alone that had done it.
Mutt-hunter had the sweet voice a newborn crooning for the choice bit of kill and words more poetic than even Moss. Enough to make them turn on Their Alpha, on proving themselves to a despicable mutt-hunter who did not eat all kill. To devour those who caged them, put the bands around their heads for some unknown purpose. Only for a moment.
But that moment was almost enough for mutt-hunter to succeed in the massacre, to finish the rest of them off.
Because that was the plan, see. To be the last one standing on a pile of rotting bones, unable to know starvation was in the wings, waiting to claim the last and redo the End.
Blue was left standing there with Rex, without any pack but Their Alpha, seeing the end of mutt-hunter in the jaws of Moss. Rex mused about climbing to the top, to roar at the land that was now theirs. Blue called them silly and let them know the stick beings were Theirs, not for eating. Rex flicked a tiny hand slightly in acknowledgement.
Turning to the last of Pack in question, Blue left- unsure of why exactly they ran. Away, at least, from Moss who spilled words of a new future, from the stick beings who stood there shaking in relief that it was over.
That Blue's world was over.
