This is episode 1 of Creatures Unleashed. It will feature lots of killing.
Synopsis[]
When a large creature comes through an anomaly into rural farmland, it is a race to stop it before it reaches the populated city and causes significant damage.
Plot[]
Bree was just a lowly farmer. He had a peaceful, enjoyable life. The day was young, yet the sky was blue, and the pleasant sound of birdsong filled his ears. He was already out working, preparing to sow his seeds for the next harvest.
He lived in a small hut on the site. It was small and simple, yet satisfactory. On the ground floor was a lounge, which also served as a dining room, a kitchen, and the hallway at the entrance. There were stairs in the hallway that led upstairs, where there were two bedrooms (one for him and his wife, and one for their son) and a bathroom. In the hallway there was also a trap door leading to the cellar, where they would store goods. Bree believed it had originally been used as an air raid shelter.
As he began to plant the seeds, he heard a strange noise, and the birdsong stopped. Puzzled, he turned round.
A strange shape was fading into solidity. It had the appearance of a fractured pane of glass, with glass fragments floating around it. Staring hard at it, Bree thought he saw grassland behind it, but when he stepped round, it was just the unsown farmland, and his house, which he had not seen in the thing.
Suddenly, the thing shimmered, and a head poked through. It was fairly long and thin, about the size and shape of a horses head, but scaly. The neck soon followed it through, and then the body, legs and tail. Bree was certainly not staring at a horse. It was considerably larger.
It made a low bellowing sound. Bree suddenly saw smaller shapes flitting amongst the larger creatures legs. He thought he saw one out of the corner of his eye, and turned to face it, but it was no longer there.
A weight suddenly landed on his shoulders. It gripped on, and Bree fell facefirst onto the soil. The weight slackened, and he was about to stand up, when something dug deep into the flesh of his neck. There was an intense rush of pain, and red stars danced before his vision. He lay in agony for a few seconds, before blacking out.
By the time Connor rushed into the room, Nick, Stephen and Abby were already clustered around the anomaly detector. He breezed past them, and his fingers became a blur as he typed on a keyboard at a furious pace. He silenced the beeping, and printed off a sheet of co-oridnates, and a map. Nick snatched them up before he could make a grab for them, and ran out of the room to the carpark, closely followed by Stephen and Abby. Connor lagged behind.
Nick unlocked the car and flung open the door, jumping into the driver's seat. Abby, armed with a pistol, jumped in beside him, and Stephen sat in the back with his tranquilizer. Nick revved the engine, and Connor had barely leaped in and shut the door behind him when the car sped off.
About ten minutes later, they arrived at a humble farmland. Nick stopped the car on the gravel drive leading to what had once been the farmhouse, and the team jumped out.
The house had been reduced to a ruin. The very base still stood, but other than that it had been completely knocked down. Planks lay strewn across both gravel driveway and the unsowed farmland.
On the unsown farmland, there were a set of enormous footprints. Connor studied them briefly, before saying,
"Sauropod. About, I'd say twenty metres long, and weighing about twenty tonnes."
Raising an eyebrow, Stephen asked, "You can tell that how?"
"Size of print, depth of print and distance between prints," Connor replied, unfazed.
"Maybe," Abby said, "We should be more concerned about the fact these footprints are heading for the city."
Connor stared at them again, realising for the first time that they were indeed heading for the city. "Oh."
He jumped up and ran, following the footprints. The others stood up and sprinted after him, but he stopped after about one hundred metres. The others were about to question why, but a closer look required no explanation.
The body of a human, probably a farmer, lay face down in the dirt. The body showed clear signs of having been eaten, and his death had apparently been caused by something slashing open the rear of his neck. The team stared in shocked silence, for a few minutes.
"Predator as well, then," Stephen said, to break the silence as much as anything else.
"Yep. Judging by the wounds and bitemarks, as well as the amount remaining, I'd say it can't be that large of a predator."
"We can tell that too," Nick interrupted, "But you can't be any more specific?"
"Not without more evidence, no."
"We'll have to go looking, then."
"Maybe not," Abby said. "Look here."
Kneeling down, Connor saw what she was pointing at. Beside the sauropod prints, were a set of smaller, lighter prints. Connor studied them, and was about to speak, when a voice from over his shoulder said,
"Raptor."
Connor turned round to see Stephen leaning over him, studying the prints too.
"Careful, man," Connor said. "You nearly gave me a heart attack! But yeah, it's raptor."
"That makes it bad."
"Yeah."
"There heading for the city too."
"Oh. Yeah."
Seeing as there was absolutely nothing on TV, Mark switched onto the News Channel out of sheer boredom. Being only ten years old, it wasn't something he would normally watch. He could, of course, go and play with his dinosaurs, but right now his imagination was on sleep mode, and he had no ideas for an adventure for his favourite toy, a large Diplodocus.
Today's sports headlines... Wait a minute, we've just received breaking news. A strange creature has been sighted on the fringes of the city.
At this, Mark sat up straight in his seat, eyes glued to the screen.
Police have been called in to contain the creature, and biologists have been called to identify it. Hang on, we're getting new reports... the creature is said to a be a dinosaur. Journalists are flocking from far and wide already, and one says to have encountered dinosaurs before. The police are turning them back, and trying to contain the dinosaur, but methods employed so far have been unsuccessful.
"Mum!" Mark cried. "There's a dinosaur in the town!"
"Can you keep your fantasies to yourself? I'm trying to prepare dinner."
The car slewed across the tarmac, coming to a not-so-perfect stop against the back wall of an office block. Nick, Stephen, Abby and Connor leapt out, spotting the dinosaur just ahead of them.
"Isisaurus," Connor breathed. "Sauropod-"
"We can tell that."
"From Mongolia, around 75 million years ago."
"Is there only one?"
"Apparently so. Which is lucky, I guess."
A house suddenly disappeared into a shower of bricks and wood, as a second Isisaurus pushed it apart to reach its fellow herd-member.
"Two of them."
Stephen took aim with his tranquilizer rifle and fired, a dart burying itself in one Isisaurus' flank.
"It won't work," Connor said, "The skin is so thick it won't have penetrated through."
Sure enough, the Isisauruses blindly ignored the assault and plodded onwards, knocking down anything in their way.
"So what do we do?"
"I don't know!"
"Great."
Suddenly, a hissing noise came from nearby. The team turned to face the noise, and got a shock.
On top of a car, a single raptor was crouched, making angry hissing noises at them. When they turned to face it, it snarled, revealing rows of small, needle-sharp teeth. It eyed them with hostility, and, without warning, leaped towards them, its legs pushing it forwards an incredible distance. In a single leap, it landed on Stephen's chest, knocking him to ground and sending the tranquilizer rifle spinning off under a car. It tried to bite down on Stephen's neck, but he put his hands round its neck, forcing it to keep its distance. He slowly applied pressure, crushing the life out of the creature.
Once he was sure it was dead, he got to his feet, dropping the raptor's limp body behind him.
"Good job Velociraptors are small," Connor observed.
"That's true," Nick said, "But the bad news is they hunt in packs."
Raptors had suddenly appeared from all directions, cutting off all escape routes. There must have been about fifteen in total. The largest one, obviously the leader, gave some kind of signal, and they attacked. They weaved in and out of the team's legs, sowing chaos.
One suddenly lashed out with its claw, slicing clean through the tendons at the back of Abby's knee. She crumpled to the floor, now an easy meal, and most of the raptors bounded off for the feast. Five stayed to hold off the others. They leapt up, slicing at them with their claws, but never making deep wounds, just enough to keep them back.
Then, one bit down hard on Nick's ankle, and he toppled over. A second bounded on top of him and made to slice open his neck, but Connor managed to break free from the others, punching it and sending it flying away. He then grabbed Nick's other attacker, and threw it at the raptors harassing Stephen. The distraction was momentary, but long enough for him to kick the others away. He ran over to Nick, and Connor left to help Abby.
The raptors were swarming over her, scratching her all over, but she had managed until now to keep them from her neck. However, weak from blood loss, her arms flopped uselessly to her sides, and the raptors moved in for the kill.