Chapter 9
The End Of A Reign

Now having seen Siegfried in action, Bryan begins to lay out his plan of attack. His plan was to move the young ones onto a ledge and position them directly behind a massive boulder situated on the ledge, which overlooked the deep end of the body of water. Their job was to act as a distraction and, if he gets chomped up, execute plan B and push the boulder over his head and knock him into the deep end, preferably head first and leg facing the sky.

They had a plan, now all they needed was bait. Everyone glares at Ducky. She was a good swimmer and a fast runner. She could lead Sharptooth into the water, and hide under while they dealt with the beast. After all, Ducky could hold her breath for a decent amount of time. Littlefoot leads the rest of the group towards the ledge while Bryan moves into a strategic shooting position where he had a direct line of fire.

He crouches behind two boulders which offered him excellent cover against claws and even bullets, and flicks the selector of his rifle to "Fire".

Meanwhile, Ducky silently and nervously creeps into Siegfried's den, a cave located near the ledge where he walked on only moments earlier. She had seen him enter the cave and figured a scream could gather his attention. The young Saurolophus hides behind a boulder and screams at the top of her lungs, causing Siegfried to momentarily turn around. He turns back towards the deeper reaches of the cave and seemingly ignores the scream as he ventured deeper in.

Ducky, figuring that Siegfried had ignored her, attempted to leave but suddenly finds the Tyrannosaurus Rex behind her. She runs out the mouth of the cave, causing the Siegfried to run after her. The Saurolophus yells as she ran towards the water, signaling to the others that the ambush was about to go down. The Tyrannosaurus Rex chases her until she dives under water.

He smells something and looks up the ledge, finding the young dinosaurs positioned behind a boulder. So that's what they have in mind, they wanted to ambush him and push a boulder onto his head. Not like he had anything to say about it. They were smart but not smart enough in his book. Unbeknownst to Siegfried, he was being the dumb one here as Bryan lined the crosshairs of his rifle on the behemoth.

The human fires a single shot which rips through Siegfried's side, penetrating his lungs and barely missing his heart. Siegfried swings in the direction where the bullet came from. His perforated lungs clearly haven't affected him yet but he had yet to see the human either. He knew Bryan was in the vicinity but where? He wasn't with the younglings and nor was he at the cave.

Where was he then?

BANG

A second shot penetrates Siegfried, this time hitting and blinding his left eye. He coils back in pain, unintentionally slamming his head into the ledge and causing Petrie to fall from his position. The Pteranodon, still unable to fly, flaps his wings desperately to gain altitude. Siegfried sees the youngling falling towards him and snarls, exhaling air from his nostrils and thrusting Petrie upwards.

Now with the added airflow, the young Pteranodon flaps with all his might and finally manages to take flight. He takes control of himself and successfully masters the art of flying. It was a personal victory for Petrie but he had no time to celebrate. Siegfried was still alive and he still had a job to do. Meanwhile back in his defensive position, Bryan fires two more shots into the behemoth, striking him in the arms and lower jaw.

Blood was pouring out from the wounds but neither of them seemed to be affecting Siegfried. At that moment the human realized he would have to repeat the same shot he did while fighting Sharptooth; a single bullet into the heart. It was a tricky shot to take, especially since he was at range, armed with an unscoped rifle, and aiming at a moving target.

Nevertheless he takes aim, closes his eyes, and exhales, pausing his respiration as he aligned the sights of his rifle. He pulls the trigger. The moon, Earth, and stars aligned. God blew on the bullet and he gut-shot the jackass right in the heart. Unlike last time, the bullet goes through the heart instead of lodging itself within. It was a fatal blow, one which quickly ends Siegfried's life as he stumbles back.

Littlefoot and the others, push the boulder over the behemoth's head, pushing him face first into the water. The body of water was Siegfried's watery grave, as evidenced by the bubbles emerging from his nostrils as he sank deeper and deeper into the darkness below.

Things were getting more and more dire for the adult dinosaurs. Their leader Bron still had his leg wedged between the boulders and the lava was closing in on him. It seems as though the male Apatosaurus was done for as his family members desperately tried to free him. Bryan digs through his buttpack, hoping to find something he could use to free the Apatosaurus from the boulders.

As he dug through his stuff, two brick shaped objects fall onto the ground. Both were wrapped with green colored plastic and there was a yellow label.

CHARGE DEMOLITION M112
WITH TAGGANT(1-1/4 LBS COMP C-4)
MA-04D028-015

They were C4 explosives which Bryan had acquired through the powers of the Illuminati and had packed for the journey. He hurries over to the boulders and plants both bricks of C4 on the boulders, one on each boulder, and attaches blasting caps to both of them along with detcord. Time for the prehistoric creations of nature to taste human technology for the first time.

WHAAM

The high velocity explosive obliterates the boulder, leaving only fragments behind. Bron was free from his "cell of doom" and he quickly makes his way back towards the herd with his wife. Oddly his mother and father in law did not follow him. The Apatosaurus turns around and finds, much to his horror, that the two elderly Sauropods were stuck on a rapidly crumbling piece of earth which was encircled by lava on all sides.

There was no way for them to get across. Both of them were too heavy to jump and the gap between them and safe ground grew bigger and bigger as the seconds went by. They were doomed and the two accepted their fate. Littlefoot however, thought differently. Despite his parents pleading him not to go back for his grandparents, the young Apatosaurus makes a leap for it and manages to land on a boulder which was surrounded by lava.

He was about to leap towards his grandparents when the ground underneath them gave way. Littlefoot and his family could only watch in horror as the two elderly Apatosauruses disappeared in the sea of molten lava. And now the young one faced an even bigger problem. The boulder he stood on was also starting to crumble and if he didn't jump to safety soon , he too would end up in the same steaming grave as his grandparents.

Bron and his wife, knowing their son could not make such a leap, craned their heads down near the boulder, forming a temporary bridge for Littlefoot to cross. The young Apatosaurus hesitates at first but overcomes his fear of falling and runs across his parents' long necks. Once their son made it to safety, the adult Apatosaurus made their own escape from the rapidly approaching lava tide.

The female was the first to start moving and she made it to safety. Bron however wasn't so lucky. As he turned around towards the herd members, a tree, felled by a nearby forest fire started by the lava, knocked him onto his side and into the burning lava pool. He didn't even have a chance to scream in pain before his life was literally burnt away from his body.

Littlefoot was shocked and horrified. His misjudgment had cost the lives of not only his grandparents but that of his father as well. Now only his mother remained and this shocked the youngling to the point where his mother had to literally carry him on her back as the adults and the rescue party made a mad dash towards the ledge which led them out of the forest and onto the Great Valley trail.

They manage to get to the ledge and escape without an issue but just when the herd thought they were safe, Talia appears out of nowhere and assaults them. Bryan was the first she went after but the Tyrannosaurus Rex wasn't interested in killing him. She just wanted him out of the fight and merely thwacked him into a boulder. The human was dazed upon impact and he struggled to focus.

In the meantime, the widow of Sharptooth focuses her attack on one particular member of the group; Littlefoot's mother. If she could kill the female Apatosaurus, she would bring a world of emotional hurt to Littlefoot, one of the young dinosaurs involved in the downing of her husband. Talia knocks her foe onto her side and clamps down on her neck, mortally wounding her.

She was about to finish the job when Bryan unleashed a hail of machine gun fire her way at point blank range. No less than fifty bullets penetrated Talia's chest, and five of them struck her heart. The rest perforated her lungs and caused internal bleeding. The Tyrannosaurus Rex was done for. Like her foe, she was mortally wounded. The only difference was that she would die much quicker than the female Apatosaurus, mainly due to the fact that her heart was struck and she was drowning in her own blood.