As the sun finally dipped below the horizon, Terence focused his attention on the fire that Tristan had made. The smell of cooked flesh soon wafted into his nostrils, causing the tyrant dinosaur's mouth to water. The roasted hind limb, in particular, was already being eyed by the giant carnivore.

The night creatures had begun to awaken. Owls, coyotes, and bats had taken to the open, now that their competitors were asleep or, at the very least, indisposed. The tyrannosaur had seen a few creatures come close to the camp, attracted by the smell of flesh, but none were large or clever enough to try and mount an attack. Even those who had numbers on their side knew better than to launch an assault.

When at last Tristan finished cooking, he offer the bison leg to Terence. Without hesitation, the tyrannosaur wolfed down the limb, crushing the bones with ease. It was a satisfying meal, but would only sustain Terence for so long - a giant carnivore needed an equally gigantic amount of food for survival.

While the fire continued to burn, other creatures went about their lives. Most interesting to Tristan was a variety of bat that crawled along the ground, hunting small rodents like voles. Though capable of flight, the bat lacked the gripping power that birds of prey had in their limbs, forcing it to hunt on the ground for large prey. This also meant that it couldn't carry said prey away from its kill site, necessitating that the predator finish its meal before leaving. Its echolocation proved annoying for the future coyotes, which whined and yipped in annoyance at the sensory onslaught.

Briefly, the bat looked at Tristan, wondering what the strange primate was doing here - primates as a group were not native to the Americas in the time of man, and while some varieties had begun to move north, to find them in a desert was absurd, even in the present - non-human primates were not adapted for such dry environments. Perhaps one day monkeys or non-human apes would learn to adapt to the heat and the lack of water, but that was unlikely.

Eventually, though, the time came for Tristan to rest. After taking a moment to pull out and play on a funny looking thing that made strange, yet oddly soothing sounds, the human doused the flames and retreated within his portable skin cave to sleep.

Terence took in one last glance around before curling up around said cave. After a few minutes, he too drifted off into the calm of sleep.

XXXXXXXXX

"Okay, I think we got the coordinates set," remarked Lucas.

"You sure about that?" replied one of the park's emergency personnel - a British man by the name of Percival.

"No, but Ramos and Lin are both exhausted, it's late, I'm running on caffeine, Nigel flat out told me to rest, and I want to at least try and see if this works. I don't want my friends to say I didn't do everything I could tonight."

"..Fair enough, kid. Open the portal."

"Portal opening in 3, 2, 1.."

With that, a portal opened within the enclosed rescue building. Before Percival and his men could act, though, a rhino promptly ran through the portal, followed by at least a dozen more of its kind. When the last one came through, a confused Percival took a moment to look at the assembled horned mammals, before deciding to fly a UAV through the portal.

The results were...honestly not surprising.

"Kid, can you check the coordinates one more time?"

"Already looking at it...damn it, I messed up five of the numbers! It's the wrong time."

"Good, cause there's a forest fire on the other side. Could you please close the portal?"

The portal promptly flicked shut.

"Well, guess it's time to call it a night."

"I guess."

Lucas took a moment to look at the new arrivals.

"..Well, at the very least, we got a bumper herd of Sumatran Rhinos. I guess that helps?"

"They aren't extinct yet, but at this point, that's only a matter of time. So yeah, silver lining. I guess."

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

Gradually, the wolves retreated into their den. Today had been a good day - they had managed to secure a carcass and bring back plenty of fresh meat for their cubs. The strange bipeds had been a surprise, of course, but they had not proven to be a danger so far.

Wolves had hardly changed in the seven million years that had passed from when Tristan had entered the portal. Their social structure and natural adaptations allowed them to survive in a variety of environments, making the transition to the new Ice Age something of minimal difficulty.

New prey had arisen for them to hunt - some descendants of familiar species, others of new ones. Most peculiar of all were the longs horns - which, as their names suggested, had particularly long horns. Many would assume these creatures to descend from pronghorns, but in actuality, they were true antelope, derived from feral gemsbok that had escaped New Mexico. New predators had arisen to hunt them, such as the giant gila monster and a larger variety of jaguar. They also preyed upon creatures that had originated from feral blackbuck, and retained their ancestors' corkscrew horns.

Now, though, the wolves were ready to rest - they had eaten their fill, and Ice Age nights were taxing on even their warmth. The occasional sound of the bats that lived nearby was annoying, but manageable.

And then the new sound came.

Instantly, the wolves retreated deeper into the den, far away from the entrance. The new hunter had emerged.

The wolves had first seen the new hunter a few months ago, when it had wandered out from its den. The creature had killed an antelope on the outskirts of their territory, and had come into a confrontation with another pack of wolves. The pack had only arrived to see the aftermath of the fight with the new hunter, but it had been a grisly sight - five wolves had been torn apart and left to rot. When the beast had returned to its kill, the pack had decided wisely to retreat.

The rival pack had since recovered, but they never came close to the pack's territory after this.

The new hunter, however, had not left. Instead, it stayed, searching for more food, occasionally harassing the wolves, and once in a while, killing anything that happened to be nearby. None of the animals ever figured out why it did the last part - it wasn't surplus killing, most of the creatures it killed did nothing to anger it, and it didn't seen to be hunting for sport.

And if the bones in the cave that it lived in (which, in hindsight, seemed to match the body shape of the smaller biped they had seen earlier) were any indication, it had done this before. But why?

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AN: Read and Review! This is Flameal15k, signing off!