Chapter 14:
As she expected, the adults went over to him. Chompless could tell by the fact that he was dragging a carcass, and by his scent that it was Ezekiel, "If they kill him…I don't want to imagine how Milo will react." she thought.
They looked at him, but, other than that, they were very idle. As Chompless was opening her mouth to speak, Ezekiel bolted to her, "No!" she thought. He tried pushing her towards the cave. He didn't make much progress.
"Come on, move! They're going to kill you!" he said. She was contemplating how they'd react if she protecting him, "No, they'll only kill you." she said to him, quietly. He looked her in the eye, "Get away from her!" Chomper yelled, running towards him. He looked at Chomper, and as he was about to pummel into him, Ezekiel put his hand up, which for some reason, made Chomper skid to a stop.
Then Ezekiel tilted his hand to the left and Chomper's head mirrored it. Then he moved it to the side, and somehow he made Chomper fall onto his side, but he couldn't get back up, "Little Rex. You could come in handy." he said. He aggravated the adults put putting his hand near Chomper's throat, "He's going to kill Chomper!" Zyra yelled to her mate. They both charged, and Chompless decided that she had to protect Ezekiel.
She walked in front of him, "Leave him alone." she said loudly, yet firmly. They skidded to a stop, confused by her actions, "Why are you protecting him? He was trying to kill Chomper!" Hadel said.
She shook her head, "No, he wasn't." she said, glancing back at him. He smiled slightly, "How would you know? You don't know who he is." Zyra argued.
"Yes, I do. This is Ezekiel. His brother, Milo, told me everything about him, and what happened to me. He is in that cave over there. (Gestures with head)" she said. They all looked where she was looking, and he waved sheepishly. Then Ezekiel walked beside her and talked to them.
Of course, as Milo had said, Ezekiel knew more about dinosaurs than anyone, and he knew how to speak their language, "I know that I appeared as a threat to her, and…to your son, but I am not. For the most part, I cannot bring myself to kill any living creature. This instance was no different. I had no intentions of hurting your son or her. In all honesty, I thought you were going to kill her, so I was trying to protect her."
"Why? What about her makes you want to protect her?" Zyra queried.
"I don't recognize her species." he answered. They didn't believe that for a second, "If you don't know what kind of dinosaur she is, you should've instinctively avoided her." Hadel said.
"I have never seen her or other dinosaurs like her before. I saved her so I could be able to learn everything there is to know about her." he said.
They were completely confused by that, "If you come to the cave, my brother will explain everything." he said. The 2 looked at each other and decided if Chompless trusted them, they should, too, "Fine. We'll listen to what this Milo has to say." Hadel said.
Chomper was still on his side, and also still unable to get up. Ezekiel put his hand on Chomper's leg and planted it on the ground, "You can stand up, now." he said. Chomper then was able to get himself up, "How did you...do that?" he asked.
"It's a trick I learned a long time ago. I typically use it on Raptors to stop them from attacking me. I know a lot of tricks with dinosaurs. Secrets, if you will, that the dinosaurs themselves don't even know."
Chomper was curious about the things Ezekiel could do, he didn't feel that it was important to ask exactly what he could do, so he said nothing.
They went to the cave, the 2 Utahraptors that Chompless dealt with appeared, and the adults just looked at them, "Don't mind those two. They don't like new people. Or dinosaurs in this instance. (To Raptors) Fegle!" Ezekiel said. The Utahs stepped behind him.
The adults weren't threatened by the Utahs in the slightest. It would've been Chomper they worried about. They sat down outside of the cave (Because they were too big to fit inside) and Milo told them the same things he told Chompless.
By the end, they were more afraid of Tyranto himself than Nickie, "That's who controls that thing? (Nods with equal emotion) We've seen this 'Derma' before. It…controlled me and made me essentially hunt for my son, who had hidden in a corpse to avoid this. But there was a female with the dinosaur. And when I couldn't find Chomper, she told Nickie to let me free, before they left and I felt myself again." Hadel said.
Ezekiel raised a brow, "The female is Tyranto's wife, Britasha. Sometimes he likes to send her and Nickie off to typically gather more carnivores while he tends to the young ones. On the surface, Tyranto, Britasha can seem very gentle. Actually, even Nickie can seem gentle, at least with those she affiliates as 'friends' and 'family.' But, usually, neither Tyranto nor Britasha makes Nickie let a carnivore, like yourselves, free. There must be something about you they haven't seen in any other carnivore. Otherwise, you would've become enslaved like the rest. Or maybe they thought you were useless. But usually, when that's the case, they'd kill you just to make sure you don't get in the way."
Chomper spoke up, "Well when I saw this thing—before my father fell under its control—it stared at me. It never seemed like it tried to control me."
Ezekiel looked at him, impressed, "How old are you?" he queried. While Chomper felt strange answering the question, but still did, "My 14th star-day was a few weeks before I discovered Chompless."
Ezekiel asked him another question, "How long have you been able to speak? Our language, I mean."
"Uh…about…9 coldtimes. I taught myself." he answered. Ezekiel was even more impressed, "Okay, but, correct me if I'm wrong, but, did you say Nickie didn't control you?"
Chomper nodded, "Is that surprising?" he asked. Ezekiel nodded back, "Very. Nickie takes control of young carnivores without hesitation and calls either Tyranto or Britasha over. And they convince the carnivores that they were 'destined' to join their army. The young carnivores have no knowledge to decline, and they still can't resist even if they wanted to. So, that means that there's something about you that perhaps scares Nickie. That's the only reason I can imagine that she didn't control you." he said.
Chomper thought about that, "Me…scaring Nickie? As much as I'd like for that to be true, I don't think it is. How could I, a small, essentially harmless Sharptooth, scare a creature as dangerous as she is? That makes no sense." he said to himself. Then, Redclaw interjected, "I hope you don't mind me asking, but, does this have anything to do with us?"
Milo & Ezekiel both looked at him, "Right this moment, no. But recently he has been more active in gathering carnivores, and they are all under threat. Given enough time, he will find you and take you." Milo said. Hadel & Zyra looked at each other, then they thought about Chomper's friends, "What about Flatteeth?" Zyra asked.
He glanced to her, "Herbivores? They're in more danger than the carnivores."
Both of them looked at each other out of the corner of their eyes, and then looked at Chomper, expecting a reaction.
The sentence took a minute to completely register in his head, but eventually, it clicked, "WHAT?" he almost yelled. Ezekiel understood his shock, "The herbivores—he says to them—that he will give them protection from all carnivores if they choose to listen to everything he says and do everything he tells them to do. Usually, they accept because he hides all his carnivores and makes himself appear friendly and honest. I mean, he does protect them, but up to a point. They make a bad decision, he leaves them to face the consequences. They slow him down, he has a carnivore kill them." he explained.
Then, Chomper got a gut-tightening thought, "What if they choose not to listen to him?" he hesitantly asked. Ezekiel looked at him.
"He kills them…"
There was no euphemism in his words. Chomper just about froze in shock, "What happened to him that made him like this?" Hadel asked.
"An Indom destroyed his village and ate his entire family right in front of him." Milo answered.
"What's an 'Indom'?" Chomper asked. The word "Indom" made Chompless have a flashback
Just days after her mother's murder, she was left on her own. She'd spent most of her time hiding in a tree from predators. In fact, most of her time was generally spent up in a tree. She slept and ate up in them. Food was hard to find. Well, it was very easy to find, but hard to get. She was relatively inexperienced, and most of her food—which was typically smaller lizards—heard her coming and bolted before she could catch them.
One day, while she was drinking from a lake, she looked at herself in the water. She saw her mother looking back at her. She couldn't help but cry. Unnoticed to her was that a Giga had seen her and was moving in to kill. She heard it rustling in the foliage, but she didn't think it was anything to be concerned about, so she continued crying.
She saw the Giga's teeth for a split-second before it charged from the brush. She panicked and froze. Right as it was about to hit her, another dinosaur came from the left and rammed into it, sending it head-first into a tree. The Giga shook the debris off itself before getting back up. It looked at Chompless and tried to attack her again. The dino that saved her stood in between her and it.
The Giga tried to move to the left, then the right. The dino mirrored it. The Giga then tried to juke it out. It started to go right, then ran left. The dino swung its claws the other way and made a cut the length of the Giga. It winced in pain and fell over again. It got up once again and now decided to target the dino because it knew it was protecting Chompless.
It ran straight at it, which it lowered down slightly, and then the Giga ran to the right to bite its leg. The dino swung its head that way and knocked the Giga into the water. It then kicked the Giga further in, piercing its side and staining the water around it red. The water was deeper and it was forced to swim, but it couldn't. The dino waited a minute before grabbing the Giga out of the after and putting its foot on its head.
Throughout this fight, Chompless was astonished that this dinosaur saved her. The dino spoke to the Giga, which responded weakly. Chompless couldn't understand what they said, but the dino took its foot off the Giga. Then the Giga got up and limped away as fast as it could. Then the dino roared victoriously as the Giga went back into the trees. Then it turned to her.
It was a King of Sharptooth, but she had no way of knowing that. She was scared, but something told her not to run.
It got down to her level and looked at her very closely. She felt slightly uncomfortable, but she couldn't exactly make it stop if she wanted to. Then it raised its head and spoke to her, "You are in grave danger. You must be careful."
She had no clue what it meant, and, since she spoke her own language, she had no way to ask what it meant. It realized that she was hungry, and it sighed before cutting off a piece of flesh from its own back. She was shocked that any dinosaur would self-mutilate, for one, but do this and then give its flesh to something else for them to eat.
She could tell there was something very unusual about this King. She took note of its appearance. It had a mostly-black body with blue streaks going vertically, and a blue underbelly. It knew she was staring at it, but it didn't mind. Then she heard someone say, "Hello? Are you there?"
She was then tapped on the shoulder by Chomper as he said the same thing, "Huh? What?" she said, quickly looking around. Chomper had her look at him, "Why did you get so quiet?" he asked.
Chompless realized the voice she heard was his and not part of the original memory, "Sorry. I just phased out for a minute. What were we talking about?" she asked. "I was explaining to your friends what an Indom was. Would you like me to explain it to you?" Milo answered.
She thought about this, "Yes, please." she replied.
"An Indom, what us humans call a… 'King of Sharptooth.' From those who have been able to get close enough to study and live to tell the tale, it is a mix of many different dinosaurs, which we call a hybrid. It does not do well with other dinosaurs, even other members of its species. They won't necessarily kill each other, but they don't like each other. They are very, very aggressive. Killing just about anything on sight, and they kill for sport. Meaning they kill, but don't eat any of the carcasses." he said.
He wasn't finished, but it made Chomper and his parents remember the mass graves they saw. They hadn't thought that a King of Sharptooth was responsible because they explained what they had seen, and Milo replied, "Indoms break the necks of dinosaurs, but that's it. Maybe a few cuts elsewhere, but nothing more. But, there is one Indom that baffles even Ezekiel. Every Indom that has ever been seen is always completely white. Just about albino, which is how we describe something with almost no colors. But there is a single Indom that is black with blue, vertical streaks, and its whole underbelly is the same color as them. Ezekiel has been interested in this Indom for years, and when the opportunity to study it further comes, he goes for it. This Indom, from what he's seen, refuses to kill any living creature. Directly, at least. Even anything that attacks it, it doesn't kill. The only way he's seen it 'kill' anything is it will swallow the creature alive without chewing on it, or it throws them into a body of water and lets them drown."
Chompless gasped quietly, "I…I've encountered this 'Indom' before. It was after my mother died. It saved me from a Giga." she said. Ezekiel moved closer and asked, "Wait…your mother?" he asked. She nodded and he asked her another question, "Was she fighting something before she died?"
She nodded again but then wondered, "Hold on… How do you know what my mother was doing before she died?"
He sighed before answering her.
"Because I was there."