Chapter 14

Taming Alan the Raptor

James was out with Shira on a mission: to tame another Raptor. After the untimely death of Barry, James had needed to tame a new one, but he hadn't had a chance. Now, he was going out with Shira, hoping they'd be able to tame one before the end of the day.

They were combing the beach, and this particular spot was unusually cluttered. It was an extremely wide beach, stretching back over 200 yards, before the sands met up with a hillside forest. They surveyed the beach. There was a bunch of Stegosaurs, Triceratops and Parasaurolophus, as well as several Apatosaurs. Further down the beach Shira pointed into the ocean.

"James, look down there. There's a Spinosaurus in the water."

James looked over. It was attacking something that looked like a shark. James didn't like it. He decided to tranquillize it and then, when tranquilized, they could either kill it, or tame it. He just decided to tranquilize it now. He fired a tranq arrow at it. It hit its mark since the Spinosaurus roared and bit at its side where James had shot it. When James saw the Spinosaurus look his way and roar loudly, he sprinted to the forest. Shira sprinted alongside him.

A bizarre fact about the Spinosaurus was how jealously it guarded its territory. A Spinosaurus' territory was almost always near water. It would do nothing short of kill you if you were on its beach as an invader, but if you run away, the further you got away from the beach the less vicious the Spinosaurus became. If you run far enough, fast enough, the Spinosaurus will usually lose interest and return to the water. James used that same tactic. The Spinosaurus would not only have to run into the forest, which was a huge grove of giant sequoia, but it would also have to run up a hill. After running a good ways, the Spinosaurus turned back to the water without even a roar. Shira and James were both breathing heavily.

"You OK?" James asked.

Shira nodded and smiled. Nothing could beat her. She had tamed a Spinosaurus, but this one was a male, and red with grey legs and arms.

"Do you want that one?" asked James.

Shira shook her head, "I think that one has some behavioral issues."

When they returned to the beach they saw a red-orange Raptor with blue-grey spines. It looked beautiful. He saw the Raptor speed down towards a Triceratops and attack. James also saw the Spinosaurus down the beach returning to its shark and dragging it onto the beach to eat. Hopefully that would keep the sail-backed monster distracted. He pulled out a tranq arrow and shot the Raptor in the thigh. It was a perfect shot, but the Raptor was distracted by the Triceratops, which has knocked it to the ground. The Triceratops was now warding it off.

He looked down the beach again, and realized with alarm that the Spinosaurus had eaten most of the shark and left. It was now attacking a Parasaurolophus, but was advancing down the beach. He shot the Raptor again. Two more arrows and the Raptor was down. This was going very well.

He fed the Raptor meat and narcotics.

"Ah…you're a beauty!" he said with excitement.

He looked to where Shira was standing, except now she wasn't there.

He shouted, "Shira! Where are you?!"

she was over near the Spinosaurus, which was currently fighting a Triceratops.

He yelled, "Shira are you out of your mind?! Get back here!"

She looked over and ran back. James was angry until she held out a pile of prime meat. It was from the Megalodon the Spinosaurus had killed.

"Never do that again." he said in a low voice.

"I won't have to." she replied.

The Spinosaurus was going on a positive rampage. One thing was for sure, this was a male who was extremely protective of his territory. It left the Triceratops it was attacking, which ran off, and it began attacking a Parasaurolophus, and in the process got closer to the two of them and their Raptor. If it got any closer he'd have to kill it. He really wanted to avoid that situation.

The Spinosaurus got away from their Raptor a bit, and they commenced naming it. It's nearly impossible to tell what gender a Raptor is, so it could be named with either a girl or boy name.

Shira looked at its blue spines, "How about Aqua? But no…this Raptor is red-orange. Lava?"

But that didn't have the ring either. The Spinosaurus kept attacking everything near its territory. It had killed almost everything near it. It turned towards James, and it looked like it was going towards them. "You'd better run..." James said.

it turned out however that the Spinosaurus turned and started attacking a Stegosaurus. This was crazy. The Spinosaurus was going on a gigantic killing spree. He decided to sneak up to it and shoot it with some arrows. He got just close enough to guarantee a shot, and then, while the Spinosaurus got pummeled by the Stegosaurus' spiny tail, James took three shots. The Spinosaurus was covered in blood. Suddenly, when the Spinosaurus tried to bite it, the Stegosaurus swung and struck the Spinosaurus hard on the head. The Spinosaurus roared and ran off. The Stegosaurus bellowed and chased it.

"Well the tables have turned." James said to himself.

The Spinosaurus went along the edge of the woods, but was running right over towards the Raptor and Shira. It roared and toppled a tree along the forest edge. James ran over to Shira, who was lying prone on the sand. The Raptor was alright, and James hit the dirt beside Shira. The Spinosaurus was stopped by three Triceratops, which began attacking it. The Stegosaurus caught up and they killed the Spinosaurus.

After harvesting some of its prime meat and recovering some of his arrows, James went back to Shira, relieved. Now they wouldn't have to look over their shoulder at a mad Spinosaurus constantly.

They kept feeding it narcotics and prime meat. It would be even easier to tame with prime meat. He had brought Rhino's Raptor vocal box. They watched and waited. James looked down the beach and saw an enemy almost as fierce as a Spinosaurus. He rarely saw them, but they did exist, and they were incredibly nasty: giant ants.

They didn't exist in the fossil record that he knew of. Some were like enormous fire ants, crawling on the ground, and they bit with huge mandibles that could sever a finger. The really deadly ones were the flying ones. The fliers were the colony soldiers, and they had stingers. The sting felt like being stabbed with a hot poker, followed by an extreme numbing sensation that debilitated most creatures.

There were giant ground ants on the beach. He charged towards them and swung at them with his pick and killed them all. There were three. When he heard a droning buzz he got really nervous.

He yelled over to Shira, "Flying Soldier Ants!"

Shira got up, leaving the Raptor and plunging into the water. James knew that if the ants stung you too many times, death would follow. He knew a Raptor would be the same, so he threw togethe an emergency plan. He looked and saw an Apatosaurus at the forest edge. He watched as the two giant flyer ants swarmed over towards him. He ran over to the Apatosaurus, hoping that the ants would start attacking the Apatosaurus, and then would leave James alone.

When a Giant Ant stung, it would release pheromones into the air that put any other stinging ants around into a blind rage. He hid behind the Apatosaurs' leg. The ants began attacking the Apatosaur, which began thrashing around and James ran away from it as fast as he could. He watched from the beach as the Apatosaur whacked with its tail, bellowing and thrashing. It slammed one of the ants with its tail, and when James found it, he killed it with his hatchet. The others must've flown away or were killed by the Apatosaur.

He looked over at Shira, "That was a close call."

Shira chuckled and looked back at the Raptor, "It better not be closer next time," she said.

It was still unconscious. He looked down the beach and saw another pair of Raptors way down the beach, going after a Stegosaurus. They left those ones alone.

James went into the forest to see if there were any narcoberries. There were crawling ants in the woods. James quickly evacuated the area, not wanting to have any more flying ants to attack him. When he got back, Shira was taming the Raptor. It was up, and Shira was performing the Raptor call. James stood still, not wanting to interfere. The taming was successful, and James suddenly found the right name: Alan.

James looked at Alan, "Welcome to the tribe of Ark, Alan."

He put on its saddle he had brought.

"Great work Shira!"

She smiled and looked back at the Raptor.

"He's a beauty!" she said.

"He sure is," replied James, suddenly shocked at just how amazing he looked.

The contrast between his bright red-orange scales and his aqua-blue spines was very eye-catching, and he was definitely a friendly one at that.

"It's a good thing you taught me how to use that Raptor Call," said Shira, "Or I probably would've been in trouble."

"Sorry I had to leave, but those stupid Giant Ants would've made even more trouble than that Raptor."

Shira huffed, "I hate them too, but at least we got the Raptor."

James looked over him again, "Well you tamed him, so you get the first go on him."

Shira held up her hand, "Oh no James he's your Raptor I don't want-"

"Please," said James, "I insist."

She shyly approached the saddle.

"Go on!" said James, "Let's see what he can do."

Shira mounted, and just let the Raptor get used to her weight before she increased the speed a bit. Before long, she was sprinting up and down the beach fast as Alan could go. She was laughing with joy on his back, and it made James' heart feel something he hadn't felt before. Maybe, just maybe, Shira had found healing.

After returning to Ark Village, Shadow, Rhino and David were the first to know.

Rhino patted the Raptor on the back, "So why not Barry two?"

James responded, "Because this one looks like an Alan."

Rhino shrugged his shoulders, "Oh, by the way, did you guys see that rampaging Spinosaurus at the beach near the Red Cliffs? That thing was killing everything!"