OverRannus

Hey so sorry but no Ultimus chapter this week, but there will be one next week!!! Sorry again for no chapter this week. Until Next Time!!!

Seriously, I got designs waiting for Val and I want to submit them!!!

Andrew watched slightly concerned as Paul cooked the meat over the fire on some parts of a car’s grill. He wasn’t sure if it would be safe to eat if it was being cooked on a car’s grill. But he was the guest, and he didn’t want to be a picky guest. He watched as Paul meticulously watched and flipped the meat on its side. The smell of the meat was far better than anything he had cooked before. He watched his surroundings and noticed the dark-haired woman exited one of the tents and walked over to them. “Mm, what are you cooking Paul?” She asked, “Lamb Chops, haven’t had one of these in years. If you want one, sit down and I’ll make you one.” He said, she shrugged as she sat down. They waited there patently there for a moment before Andrew broke the silence. “I’m sorry to ask but what is your name? I know Paul wanted to wait until Sylas came back, but I at least to know your names.” He said, the woman looked at him with soul-piercing eyes. “Erica, Erica Stevens.” She said, “Nice to properly meet you, Erica.” Andrew said, she nodded. She still didn’t trust him but he was slightly indifferent to this for the time being. A few moments later, Paul came over to Andrew and Erica. Setting down a plate in front of each of them. “Here you go. Hope it's good, wish I had more seasonings than salt. But it should be better than the food I had to live with. Almost everything we made in my time was boiled.” Paul said, Andrew switched off his vest and then his gloves to eat. As he did, Erica and Paul looked at Andrew with slight concern seeing this. Andrew was kind of confused by this, what was so concerning about this? “Are you okay? You're not sick or anything?” Erica asked, Andrew looked at her confused by this, then looked at himself and realized she was talking about how pale he was. Since he didn’t have much sunlight where he lived, and that he never took the armor off when outside of his property. His skin had become extremely pale underneath the armor compared to his tanner neck and face. “Oh, no. I am fine. I just don’t get much sun out in a forest where it is always dawn or dusk without ever knowing.” Andrew said, Erica raised her eyebrow. “Still I think I should check you for any medical needs or issues. Yer lookin’ very Peely Wally.” Paul said, “Are you a doctor?” Andrew asked, “Aye, I am.” Paul said “Where do you live?” Erica asked, interrupting the original conversation. “Camacho International Forest.” He answered. Erica nodded, “Dusk.” “Excuse me?” “The Earth rotates counterclockwise, Camacho’s East, North East of Sanctuary. It’d be constantly dusk.” Erica continued. Honestly surprising Andrew. For both why he didn’t know that or why he never researched into it and that he finally had an answer of what time of day it was for him. He smiled and nodded his head “Thank you.” And with that, they continued eating, Paul had made an excellent meal out of the mutton. And after some time, Sylas returned from cleaning up. He wore a beige tee shirt but similar pants and shoes to the others. Except they were dyed and painted up with strange symbols and some familiar-looking logos. “You guys ate without me?” “Well, what else were we going to do while we waited for you to clean up.” Paul said, “You could’ve at least saved me some.” Sylas said sadly. Paul pointed to a covered plate on the table. Sylas’ eyes widened with happiness. He tried running to the table before he was stopped. “Let’s do proper introductions first before you eat.” Paul said, Sylas quickly turned to Andrew and began blurting out quickly “The name’s Sylas Fennec, there. I smell meat, come to Papa!!” He tried rushing for the food again before being stopped by Paul again. “Come on lad, let’s do this properly.” Paul said, “It’s fine if he wants to eat, he already introduced himself to me earlier.” Andrew said cutting in, “No, I think we should do proper introductions. It’s not fair that we asked you and you gave us a full introduction and we didn’t. So would you mind Sylas?” Paul asked with a smile. Sylas whimpered and sighed. “Alright. But I need to eat after I give mine. I haven’t eaten all day.” Sylas fibbed, he just really wanted to eat the cooked meat before Jonathan tried to claim it. ~ The four walked toward the center of the base camp with Sylas talking Andrew’s head off with questions and references while Erica and Paul hung back. Paul looked at Erica who looked a little flushed. Something to be on her mind and it was worrying her. “You alright Erica? Do I need to check you out too?” He asked quietly, she looked over at him realizing that he noticed her. “No, I am fine.” Erica said, “Ya sure about that?” Paul asked. “Yes, I just don’t like getting into personal things about me.” Erica stated, Paul smirked. “You think now, huh?” He said sarcastically, she glared at him slightly before sighing. “It makes me vulnerable, I don’t like leaving myself vulnerable.” Erica answered, “Look, I know ya, but we barely know ya ourselves and we have opened our feelings and past to ya. It makes you hard to trust but from our experience with. You are trustworthy… Just tell him what ya feel comfortable telling, but I would like to let him know that we trust him and let him trust us.” Paul said, Erica nodded as they walked. “Alright, but just this once. And I am only giving him a bit.” Erica said, Paul smiled. “That’s all I am askin’ for Erica. That’s all.” Paul said, The group got to the edge of the campsite, nearly outside of the building. Freya stood there wearing her Fur/Flak combo while holding the prod in one hand and having her axes strapped to her belt. Jonathan was also there, covered in material dust and next to a Doedicurus and Ankylosaurus. He was covered in material dust from scraps and stones. Paul sighed, he hoped that the introductions went well. ~ Andrew stood there awkwardly as he was surrounded by people he didn’t know. It was a strange feeling, he became very self-conscious of himself. He was really young the last time he interacted with others. He was awkward with people even then, though this was more learned from his father who didn’t like public events. Probably why he he wanted to work on the remote side of The Terran’s project. Paul was talking to the others as he stood alone there for this moment. Andrew while feeling awkward felt kinda relieved being around people. However, at the same time, he wanted to go insane if he didn’t have a proper conversation with something he would normally talk to. This made it stranger that he would rather talk to an animal and pretend it would talk back to him than talk to someone who could actually talk to him. He just wasn’t used to it yet. He hoped anyway. Paul turned around smiling at Andrew. Andrew smiled back out of kind manners. “Alrighty, so we’ll start off with me and work on our way through everyone in our group and then back to you. Don’t feel obligated to say more than you're comfortable saying.” Paul said, Andrew nodded lightly. “That’s fine, and I hope none of you feel that you are obligated to tell me everything about yourselves.” Andrew said, Paul nodded and smiled. “Alrighty, so my full name and title is Dr. Paul Murdock Riddley, leader of our small band of survivors. Born in the year of our LORD, 1912, in Peterhead, Aberdeenshire, Scotland though raised for a large part of my childhood in Dover, Delaware. I went to New York University for a degree in medicine before being called to arms and drafted into the US Army in 1942. The last date I fully remember was July 10th, 1954. I am 42 years old.” Paul said, “Nice to properly meet you, Dr. Riddley.” Andrew said, Paul smiled and looked at the next person in the line. That being Erica, she looked at Paul with an awkward, concerned look. He stared at her in a serious tone and she gave him a look back. “My name is Erica Stevens, second in command here. Born in 2354, Arat Prime. Worked for the URE on the Ark Initiative for seven years in the year 2379, which was the last time I remember anything before arriving on the Ark. I am 25 years old. That’s all I have to say.” Erica said, “Nice to meet you, Erica.” Andrew said. Eric looked to Sylas who smiled excitedly. “How do you do, My name is Sylas Archibald Fennec. I was born in 2025, in Phoenix, Arizona. Became one of the youngest billionaires in the world, and moved to Silicon Valley. The last date I remember was the Fourth of July of 2050. Once I reached the Ark, I was enslaved by a madman and held hostage for three years. I am 28 years old.” Sylas said, “Nice to be properly introduced Sylas.” Andrew said smiling. Jonathan took a step forward and cleared his throat. “Bonjour, je m'appelle Jonathan Ducasse, je suis né en 2164 dans la ville de Marseille, en France. J'ai obtenu mon diplôme de Sciences et Lettres à Paris avec une maîtrise en Zoologie et Paléontologie en 2189. La dernière date dont je me souviens avant d'être bloqué sur l'Arche était le 12 janvier 2190. J'étais coincé sur l'Arche pendant un an à étudier sa vie avant de rencontrer ce groupe de nemrods. J'ai 36 ans. Et je ne pense pas que je vous aime.” He said fluently, however, Andrew didn’t understand a word he said. “I’m sorry, but what did he say?” “Que veut-il dire par là ? Est-il stupide ou son implant est-il défectueux ?” He said, “No, Jonathan neither. He doesn’t have an implant. He’s never been on the Arks before.” Paul said, “Oh, et bien, très bien. Alors je peux dire ça sans le blesser. Je le déteste, je le déteste beaucoup. Je vais le tuer, je le tuerai avec du venin de Titanoboa jeudi prochain. Je ne sais pas quand c'est, mais appelons-nous demain jeudi prochain. Ça te semble bien ? Super !” Jonathan said, Paul and everyone else except Andrew glared at him. “No, Jonathan. That’s not okay.” Paul said annoyed “What kinda sicko are you?” Sylas said agitated. “What did he say?” Andrew asked, “Nothing.” Erica said faster than light. “Très bien, si je ne peux pas le tuer, alors sais-tu quelle langue il parle ?” Jonathan said irritatedly, “English. Right, Andrew?” Sylas asked, Andrew nodded. “Fine, if he can only understand English. Then I will use it-” “Woah, wait a minute. You can speak English?” Sylas interrupted. Jonathan glared at him. “Yes, why is this important?” Jonathan asked. “I don’t know, maybe because it wouldn’t hurt our brains trying to listen to you speak when your mouth doesn’t move a the same time!!!” Sylas yelled, Jonathan glared at Sylas for a moment longer before ignoring his last statement and looking back at Andrew. “Hello, my name’s Jonathan Ducasse. I am a Paleontologist and Zoologist and I am really tired of speaking so I shall abide my farewells.” Jonathan said in a more broken English as he walked passed Andrew. “Hey, get back here!! You and I have a lot more to talk about now!!” Sylas said to Jonathan before turning around to Andrew. “Again it was nice meeting you.” He said before going up and hugging Andrew and then running after Jonathan “Well, it was, oh. It was nice to meet you too.” Andrew said. Leaving Freya as the last one to introduce herself. And as she began to speak, Erica translated what she said. “Hello, I am going to keep this nice and simple. My name is Freya, Daughter of Jorgan the Peaceful. I do not know of what these numbers are or what ‘dates’ are. All I know is I was born during a new moon. Before coming here or the place we left before here. I was a general and trainer for a tribe that adopted me and called me an angel of their village. I am sorry to leave abruptly but I am going to go tame something and I don’t want to lose track of it.” Erica said translating Freya. Freya smiled wide at Andrew and began speaking again. “It was nice meeting you and I am sorry if I scared you earlier.” Erica translated. Andrew smiled. “It’s alright, and it was nice meeting you too!” Andrew answered, she smiled once again before leaving camp and going off into the abandoned city. Andrew thought for a moment as Erica and Paul talked to each other. He thought he heard Freya’s name before from a history book he read several years ago, something out of Norse history but he wasn’t entirely sure. He wasn’t even sure how it was possible for all of these people from different and even far points in time from each other to be here in front of him. It was confusing to him all around and he wasn’t sure how it worked. “Hey Andrew, why don’t we get ya a tent and a bed and you tell us where you want it.” Paul said, Andrew smiled as he looked to the ground. ‘These people have been so kind to me so far, is that enough to trust them though?’ He thought to himself. ‘No, but it doesn’t mean I can’t stick around a bit longer’ “Sure, let's do that.” He said, he still was awkward and nervous around them but he still wanted to give them a chance to earn his trust. Which at this time was coming on its way.

Sylas Fennec was the only one up working in the base camp while the others were gone. Something that even he was surprised about since he rather sleep in until noon. Though he didn’t know what time it was so for all he knew it could be midnight. He had several baby rockarrots in a tray of tools he was using on his current project. He liked munching on them while he worked. His project was to work on several droids or “Sir5rM8s”, that’s what people back on the Arks called them. He was properly adding in the main computer components and wiring as he listened to the futuristic boombox he fixed earlier. Erica built the robots the other day and he wanted them finished before they got back. It made it easy to build when you set up camp in a futuristic arcade. She said she built them as well as the ones on the Ark. And she did, though he wished that she didn’t. He wished that she made them a little more unique. The ones back on the Ark looked like pot belly Star Wars droids, identical in every way and they all sounded the same. He tried making them unique but his master never wanted them that way. He wanted them all the same, but now he has control over that and he can program them to speak however the heck he wants. And nothing was going to stop him. Out of one of the tents came a man. He was rather tall to Sylas but to be honest everyone in the group was rather tall to his five foot four stature. He wore glasses and his hair was a dark brown cut fairly short. And he was average built. He stared over at Sylas with a distasteful expression. This was Jonathan Ducasse, the Zoologist/Paleontologist from the future. Or his future he guessed as Jonathan was from a hundred years in his future. He was a man of high standards and a strong personality. A typical stereotype of his people from what he can tell. Though in his time traveling around the world. He met nice - “Sylas, what is this horrible noise you have playing? And why did you waste your time working on that stupid stereo that you got out of that rundown car? You could’ve done better things with your time and got more work done. Like cleaning up after the animals.” He said in an annoyed tone as the stereo played “Royal”. “Can you please be quiet Jonathan? I haven’t heard any of this song for a over year. Or 200 years or whatever. However long it’s been. I am just so thrilled to hear songs like this one!! So shut it as this song plays.” Sylas said, “At least clean up the area around Phil. It smells like an Elephant enclosure here or a Sanitation Facility.” Jonathan groaned, Sylas looked at him with slight irritation in his eyes. “First, his name is Phil the II. Second, bite me, Jonathan. I’m finishing these droids then I’ll work on cleaning the pens. Heck, I can program these so that we can get more important stuff and work done.” Sylas said, Jonathan rolled his eyes. “You don’t work around here Sylas. All you do is tinker with anything that has a motherboard. I do your work and I really don’t want to clean up after your ape, again. I just finished my field notes on the differences between Arthropluera from the Carboniferous period and this species of Arthropluera and like to get on to a few more done before I go farming resources for huts and forging equipment.” Jonathan said. “Alright. I’ll get it done… but you know, I could get these finished up quickly so you don’t hav-” “Just clean up Sylas. Preferably now and put the robots on hold.” Jonathan said sharply as he turned around. Sylas mockingly copycatted him as he walked away. Jonathan turned around and looked at Sylas disgracefully. Sylas sat there smiling. “Sylas, you are such an immature and childish person, and you’re I’m a wimp that you can’t even defend yourself. You’re more of a burden than you are a blessing. Get to cleaning up after the animals or learn how harsh I can be.” Jonathan said, Sylas chuckled. “I’ve seen it, at least ten times now. And your threats are getting repetitive as Dread Pirates Robert’s with Wesley. I’ll get it done though, after I finish these droids.” Sylas said, Jonathan gave him a death glare. Sylas smiled wide as he stuck a baby rockarrot in his mouth like a cigar. He wished it was one, not like he smoked or anything but because it would have felt much more baller. Jonathan shook his head and turned away. “Typical lazy Americans.” he continued as he walked away. Sylas sighed as he munched on his rockarrot and got back to the droids. ‘And our forefathers fought alongside them. I wonder how many wanted to strangle them.’ He thought as he touched a live wire. “Ah!! Son of a hamster!!” He yelled, dropping the rockarrot from his mouth. As he stuck his finger in his mouth, he thought about what Jonathan said. He wasn’t lazy, he was working hard on what he was specialized for. Sure he couldn’t or didn’t help with as many things as the others. But he didn’t feel he could help or he’d mess up something if he did. So he stuck with what he knew he could do, and some of the mundane tasks that needed to be done. Sylas sighed as he put down his tools and took one more rockarrot to munch on. He’d finish up the droids after he cleaned up the base camp. ~ Andrew and the survivors traveled their way through Sanctuary where they said they set up base camp. It felt unusual, he was walking alongside three other people and two of them were riding dinosaurs. Something he had lost hope to ever happen. He wondered if there was hope for Earth if they brought down these Arks. He wasn’t quite sure, but he did wonder. And though he didn’t trust this group of people yet, he didn’t distrust them either. He wasn’t sure, while the blonde-haired woman saved him and the man named Paul was kind to him and showed him mercy, but he had to wonder if they had something planned. He couldn’t tell if they had ulterior motives though, but he could definitely feel that the black-haired woman didn’t trust at all. And he couldn’t blame her, he threatened to kill her friend. He regretted doing that, fear and surprise had got to him. He wishes he could go back and change it, but what’s done was done, no changing that now. As they walked in silence, he had a question that kept racking in his brain that he couldn’t help but ask. “How did you get those?” He asked softly, Paul looked back from the back of his mount. He stopped for a moment “What’s it laddie?” Paul said curiously, not hearing it properly. “How did you get those? The creatures?” Andrew asked, Paul chuckled “Well, it’s a wee bit difficult to answer. But many of them have different ways to tame these animals. Some like Erica’s you have to tranquilize them and feed them to tame, others like this wee one here under me have unorthodox and complicated methods to tame. Though not all can be tamed” He answered. “Oh.” Andrew said, he wondered if he was able to do this with Tracy. “We’ll explain more about it to ya when we get back to camp. Jonathan has been studying every creature we’ve seen so far and has each of their taming methods.” Paul said smiling. Andrew smiled back kindly, he never imagined himself riding a dinosaur as an adult. Seemed crazy to him. As they walked through the city, they saw robots and avoided them. Paul said that most were aggressive towards them when they arrived so they avoided them as much as possible since then. Several did try to attack the group, but Paul’s dinosaur dispatched them quickly. Finally, they arrived at where the camp was located. An old arcade with a mascot vaguely resembling a ghost hanging over the side. Most of the building was dilapidated enough that the windows and parts of the side of the building were no longer there, while still being structurally strong. Paul and Erica dismounted their dinosaurs and began going with Freya and Andrew following behind. Andrew observed the area of the building inside as he entered. Most of the arcade machines were either destroyed or dilapidated over time. What used to be carpet was now soil with ferns and larger plants. The ceiling of the first level was completely gone, showing the plumbing, ductwork, and skeleton of the building. As they went further into the building, Andrew began to notice primitive, made structures. Mostly that of wood and stone, though a few tents were in-circling a campfire. “Welcome to our camp!! Feel free to explore while we drop some stuff off in our tents and go find the other two. Then will properly introduce you to everyone.” Paul said smiling, Andrew nodded and smiled back before exploring the rest of the camp. Paul sighed to himself as he watched Andrew walk off to the other side of camp. He hoped that he didn’t make a mistake bringing him here. He had hope in him, but he knew this young lad had been through some things. He looked over at Erica who stared in the same direction as where Andrew was walking. Paul rolled his eyes and chuckled. She had so much distrust against the boy for being afraid. Though he couldn’t blame her either. But she always seemed to be distrustful of newcomers, to Sylas, to Freya, to Jonathan. Even to him when they first met on that cold beach. It just seemed to be her nature. The same with her tight lip about her past, even Jonathan wasn’t as tight-lipped as her, though his being more on his academic excellence. Everyone else when they met in their group couldn’t wait to say something about them or try to be friends by sharing some backstory. But not her, all she would say was her name, that she worked on the Arks as an engineer, and that she was from the future. She was distrustful of the world. But from her eyes, it didn’t seem like she was always like this. Like something changed her. She looked over at him with a serious tone on her face. “Hope you know what you're doing Paul, I don’t like him.” She said, “Now why don’t ya? Is it because you don’t like how tight-lipped he is? I thought that might make you more comfortable around him.” “You know perfectly well what I mean Paul. I don’t like him being here and I-” “I, I know, you don’t trust him. And I know we’ve been through Nottingham and back on the Ark but you have to take a leap of faith with people Erica. It’s the only way to trust. Now for me, I don’t know what to think of him yet. But I know if I left him out there alone or to go wherever he would’ve gone. That something bad could happen to him in the state he was in.” Paul said, “And what’s so bad about that?” “Erica, I took an oath to do no harm, if I let him go knowing full well that he could harm himself. It would be no better than if I harmed him myself.” “But you killed before Paul, you killed soldiers in war and you killed people on the Ark.” “I only did what I had to do Erica, I had no choices in war. I gave them a chance to aid me in not making those hard choices, but they threatened to hurt others under my watch. And becomes the same circumstance. Same with on the Ark, and it doesn’t mean I am not convicted of the choices I made Erica. They haunt me, from the first life I took to the last. But I do not take a life unless they threaten to take one life for their own.” Paul answered, Erica stayed quiet. She turned around to look back at Andrew before looking at Paul. “At least keep a close eye on him, Paul, I still don’t trust him but if you think we should keep an eye on him. I’ll be keeping mine on him.” “Aye, I will. And remember who’s in charge around here Erica, I don’t have to ask you or Freya for any advice. And I don’t have to take orders from you.” Paul said jokingly, Erica smirked a bit. “But you do anyway.” “Aye, because you’re more stubborn than a Scotsman.” He said before both chuckled about it. “Hey Erica…” Freya called as she walked out of her tent and over to them, she had changed out of her Desert Cloth Pants in trade for Flak while they had talked. “Do you know where that weird spear that lights up you were working on went off to?” Freya asked, “The Electric Prod? I think it’s in my tent right now.” “Oh, okay. Would you happen to be done with it? I would like to use it if you are done.” Freya continued, Erica looked at her with a questionable expression. “Uh, sure. But why do you need it.” “You and Paul said that they are used for knocking out things. And I wanted to finally go get a mount of my own, I saw something that I thought would be good for me and I would like to use the prod on it.” Freya said, “Okay, now I know I modified the prods a bit so that they can be used more than once once and all. But wouldn’t be easier to just use a rifle? I got one-” “I don’t use your ranged weapons or weird magic weapons, Erica. It takes the challenge out of the fight and dulls your mind. Now with this ‘prod’ is as far as I go. It still holds the challenge I use to sharpen the mind but won’t kill me when I use it on this beast.” Freya said, again Erica looked at her with a curious look “What are you going to tame Freya?” “Just a fine mount for a first tame.” Freya answered. “Alright, do you need any help with this tame?” Erica asked, “I’m fine by myself, but that you for asking.” She said smiling, “Oh, Freya. Do ya mind waiting a wee bit before so that we can introduce ya properly to Andrew?” Paul asked, Freya smiled wide, “Not at all, I would love to introduce myself to him.” She said, before a smile slowly left “But how would we go along on doing that if he can’t understand me?” She continued, Paul rubbed his chin for a moment as he pondered on that. “We’ll figure something out, don’t worry. Just be sure you stay for a week bit.” He said before she nodded and walked away over towards her tent again. ~ As he began to explore their camp, he wondered to himself how long it took them to learn how to build this stuff small stable-sized pens, on his left one had a giant bipedal ape looking like an ancient cryptid with the name ‘Phil the Second’ on the front of the stable’s gate. To his right was another stable with a giant centipede inside. Andrew had seen these centipedes before, even getting close enough to be spat at by one. But he had never been close enough to see its compound eyes individually. There was a name on the gate but he couldn’t read it. There were a few more stables with some smaller creatures like dodos and sheep. He heard a loud noise from behind him and heard a strange noise and dull hooting from one of the stables behind him. “Yeah, is that funny Phil? Is it funny to see me struggle to clean up your mess? Well, it's not.” A voice came from the same stable. The hooting didn’t stop though. Andrew came around to the stable seeing the strange hulking ape again, but noticing a small man lying on the ground. The ape walked over and lent his hand to the man. The man looked at the ape and humorously shook his head. “You know, this is your fault, now I’m gonna have to take a bath because of your mess.” the man said as he reached for the ape’s hand and lifted himself. He was roughly half or a third of the ape’s height. His red hair was short and curly. He wore similar clothes to the others, except they looked like they were dyed or drawn on to add designs. Though there were mud streaks all across his clothes now. “I wish you could learn to use a-” he said before turning and letting out a high-pitched scream as he stared at Andrew. Andrew jumped in surprise. The man ran behind the ape and hid behind him as the ape let out a growl and clenched its fists. The man peered from behind the ape and looked at Andrew suspiciously “Who are you? Where did you come from?” The man asked, Andrew raised his hands in the air as the ape growled even louder. “My name is Andrew, and I came here with Paul and your friends.” Andrew said, the man's suspicious look turned into curious wonder as he stepped away from the ape. “Really? Well then where did you come from?” The man asked, “I am Camacho Forest, but if you mean what Ark, I didn’t come from one. I have been down here this whole time.” Andrew said as the man’s eyes lit up. “Really, how many are down here?” He asked “Counting myself, one. I am the only one down here that I know of.” “Oh, well how long have you been alone?” The man asked “My time of being awake, twelve years. But I don’t know exactly for sure how long I have been the last. I was in Cryostasis for a millennia.” Andrew said, the man’s eyes widened in surprise. “I’m sorry what?” “In layman’s terms, I was asl-” “I know what it means, it’s kinda hard not to know if you watch Sci-Fi shows or play those types of games. But you're saying you're the real deal? A Rip Van Winkle?” The man said cutting in. “Who?” “Old Reference, sorry. You're a Captain America or a Han Solo?” He said, “I still don’t know who you're talking about.” “How is the future this advanced yet have no recollection of timeless classics!!” The man said infuriated, the man seemed to be so goofy that while even angry. He seemed to be more silly than really angry. “Well, I can say you can probably change out that timeless part of that title.” “Forget what I said, the point is I know what you're talking about and now you are lost on my references.” He said, “Sorry for the rabbit trail, but you’ve survived alone for twelve years. How old are you? Twenty, Nineteen?” “I’m Twenty-Three, I have survived out here since I was eleven.” Andrew said, the realization came over the man’s face. “Sylas! Can you come here we have someone we-, oh I see you two have already met.” Paul said, the man nodded. “Yeah, Andrew’s been telling me about himself, but I forgot to introduce myself. The name’s Sylas Fennec, nice to meet you, Andrew!” Sylas said as he raised his hand out to shake. Andrew smiled and shook hands with him. “Why are you out here Sylas? I thought you’d be workin on the droids Erica made?” “Well I was, but Jonathan told me that I should clean the pens up instead of messing with the droids. And I have been, well except I slipped and covered myself in mud and whatever else is in Phil’s pen.” Sylas said, Paul groaned and shook his head. “Sylas, I’m sorry but I didn’t need you working on the pens right now. I needed you to do the droids. Jonathan was supposed to be doing the pens and he was also supposed to leave you alone. I should’ve told both of you but you were sleeping. I told Jonathan this though before we left and I thought he’d listen. Those droids will cut back on our farming and harvesting allowing us to explore and map out this area.” Paul said, Sylas mouth was open from this and he looked at the mess he was in. “Go clean up, thank ya for help on the pens. I do appreciate it Sylas.” Paul continued, but Sylas didn’t seem to hear this as he got out of the pen and walked out of view. Paul sighed and turned to Andrew “Sorry, ya had to hear that. Do ya care to eat while we wait for him?” Paul said, Andrew smiled. “Sure, I can go from some to eat.” “Ah good!! We have some mutton that I have been excited to cook up and eat, and after Sylas comes back, I’ll properly introduce you to the rest of our camp.” Paul said, Andrew smiled. He would like to meet the others properly and not under so startling circumstances. “I’m fine with that.” He said, “Alrighty, I’ll show ya where we eat.” Paul said as he led the way with Andrew following behind.

Andrew stood there in front of these three. Were people always this strange and curious? He sure felt like it was true, but he wasn’t sure if feelings were getting rubbed off from one another. But it was strange that they didn’t know how much time had passed. And what were these ‘Arks’ that they spoke about? It was all confusing and giving him a headache, but he needed answers now. “You didn’t know how long you all been in these Arks? What are these things and why are you all up there?” Andrew asked, the one woman looked at him. Her hair was jet black and her face stern and her stare cold to him. She was about average height yet lean. “What year are you from?” She said, Andrew gave her a confused look. “What does that have to do with anything? All I need to tell you is that I’m from the Terran Federation and my birth year.” He said snippy. “Okay, then Fed. Do you know about the two projects that the Feds and URE were involved with?” “Project Atlas and Project Prometheus? Yeah, who doesn’t. I wanted to work on Prometheus with my parents.” Andrew answered. She nodded. “Okay, well our group didn’t know before they met me. I worked on Project Atlas or what we called it. The Ark Initiative.” She said. “Okay, but what is it? What is the Ark Initiative?” Andrew asked, she huffed and scowled. “Let me finish alright? In layman's terms, they’re lifeboats. They contain every form of life from every era. The URE believed that these ‘lifeboats’ could be used to reseed the Earth. They were supposed to drop after a few hundred years, just to let the Earth recover from the Element War and the element that was everywhere. But if a thousand years have passed, then something happened to stop it from happening naturally.” She said, “Could it have anything to do with these zombie dinosaurs?” “What?” She asked, Andrew looked over at one of the bodies lying on the ground and pointed to it. The woman with the jet-black hair walked up to it. She knelt and observed it for a moment. She seemed very curious about the corpse. Andrew walked up to see what she was doing. She reached her hand out and then hesitated before committing herself to touching its leathery skin. Nothing happened, she sighed in relief and then focused her attention on the vine-like material. This was the first time Andrew had ever got a good look at the stuff. She began touching the vine material and scraping at it. Flaking off black and magenta material. Andrew looked at the material and felt that he recognized it in that form. “Is that-” “Element.” She whispered, though not quite enough for Andrew to not hear. “But, Element had no signs of doing this before? Even the war sights were said to only have veins growing in polluted Element like the flakes we see here.” “Element Erica, like the material we use in Tek?” Paul asked, “Yeah, Tek gear runs on Element. How do you know that?” Andrew asked back. “Because we’ve used Tek before. And this is Element. No doubt about it. Though it seems to be a more unstable form than normal.” “But how? Element doesn’t do this.” Andrew said, “It’s been a thousand years right?” Erica asked “Yeah, at least that long.” Andrew confirmed. “Well, there you go. You already see how much it spread across the Earth from the war fields of our era. So the Element could have easily changed. It learned, it evolved.” She said, everyone looked at her confused for a moment. “But I thought… is Element alive?” Paul asked. “No, but a professor I had in graduate school said that Element was an element of its own. He studied Unstable Element for several years and noticed that it has some uncanny qualities to the brains of living organisms. He even theorized that it may be able to gain sentience with how advanced the material can become and how mailable and versatile the substance is. And with it being able to be a near-infinite power source at a large enough scale. It could live forever.” Erica explained. “And you thought you could just wait up in space until it disappeared?” Andrew said, “Look, at the time it was just a theory at the time. We didn’t actually know. Now that we do know. It’s imperative that we reseed our Ark to Earth.” Erica said, Andrew scoffed at this. “Why? It’ll die as soon as it touches the Earth. Either by the Element as you said or by these monsters.” He added. “It won’t. At least it shouldn’t. The bottoms and sides of the Arks are encased with a Refined Element, Element that can’t get corrupted by the raw, corrupted Element. And the creatures will have a very difficult time getting through the natural barriers. We designed them to detour humans from running to the station’s force barrier. But once those disappear after the reseeding, the natural barriers will become safety barriers for those inside.” Erica said, Andrew shook his head. “But why? Why do we need to bring it down? If it isn’t time-” “ Because theirs only six of us and we need more of us to find how we can eliminate the Element. And the proper reseed process could take a thousand years more. We need help to bring them down.” Erica said, “I don’t like the sound of this. We should diagnose the problem beforehand.” Andrew stated. Erica looked at him with distaste. “Lucky for us, we don’t have to follow your way.” Erica said bluntly. “Erica!” Paul said, she looked over at Paul with a stubborn expression. “I’m just saying the fact that you are our leader Paul and all I advise is that we reseed just the Ark we just came from. That way minimal damage is done if anything happens and at the same time we end this Element issue at a greater pace with more numbers.” Erica said, Paul shuffled his step as he thought it through. His face was concerned. “You sure you can do this without killing everyone on there? And you are sure that this won’t be a death sentence for everything on the Ark?” Paul asked. “I’m pretty sure the natural borders will keep them safe. And with Syla’s doing the heavy with the tech support on reseeding the Ark and me there to give coords and talk him through some of it. I can guarantee it’ll come down safely.” Erica said, Paul nodded in deep thought. “I think…” he said before sighing, “… I think we’ll go ahead and make steps toward this plan. But if there are any signs of danger or we see any possibility of risk. We go with his plan.” Paul said, Erica’s face was more in shock. She huffed before she turned and whistled her dinosaur. The animal slowly came down from the ridge it was at and stopped directly in front of her. It looked similar to Tracy back at home. But this one looked way more like a Triceratops than she did. Erica walked next to the dinosaur and mounted a saddle that was on its back. “Well I don’t know about you, but I am beat. It was nice to meet you sir but I think it’s time we head back to base.” She said while he knew she was trying to get away from him as fast as possible. He was thankful, he wanted to go home, he felt horrible for everything he did and didn’t think he deserved being saved though he was grateful for it. But the blonde-haired woman looked at her with confusion. “Hvorfor inviterer vi ham ikke til baseleiren vår? Han har ingen andre med seg Erica.” She said, Erica looked at her like she said something horrible. “I don’t think that’s a good idea.” “I do though, Andrew. Would you like to come to our base camp for a couple of days?” Paul asked, Andrew stood there in an awkward position and was silent. He wasn’t sure what to say, his mind wanted to say not today but his mouth moved faster than his mind. “Sure, ah- yeah. Just ah- let me grab my bow and knife.” He blurted, regretting almost as he spoke. Paul smiled. “Great! Would you like to ride a passenger on my mount or Erica’s?” He said smiling, Erica looked at him with irritation. “Actually, I think if it’s all the same with you. I’ll walk myself to your camp.” Andrew said, Paul nodded with a kind smile on his face. “That’s fine, Freya didn’t bring anything and she doesn’t like to ride as a passenger so she can keep you company. We leave as soon as you're ready.” He said, “Thank you.” Andrew said as he walked off to grab his stuff. “You're going to love it and I think you’ll get along great with one of the guys there.” Paul said, ~ Inside the heart of Sanctuary. All was peaceful, inside animals were roaming, hunting, and droids protecting the city from the corrupted creatures outside but somewhere along the way had lost their main purpose. Now seeing all things that haven’t been in Sanctuary for who knows how long as their enemies. Inside a particular building in Sanctuary was a base camp for some survivors. Where several creatures stood around, some grazing, some sleeping, some observing. And what they were observing was a man. The man had short red curly and was not all that tall. He labored over a box he found in a car that he had been working on for the past few hours. Messing with wires and paying attention to a screen on the box. He had the box connected to a generator that the others had made. As he worked on it, he shocked himself by touching a live wire. “Ah!!! Mmmooottthheeerrr… brother, sister, Father!!!” He screamed out in pain at the top of his lungs. Before realizing that the person who was also left in camp was still asleep and he shushed himself. He really didn’t want to wake up that guy. Putting his fingers that he shocked in his mouth as he whimpered. He looked back at the wires and computer motherboard inside. Everything looked ready to go. He sighed to himself “Please work.” He said to himself, it had been so long. He turned it on and a blue light came on the screen. And a menu popped up. The man was ecstatic. He started flipping through the menu and reached the page he wanted. He turned up the volume on the box and pressed the button to start. Almost immediately the box came to life with music rhythm and beats that had been so long since the man had heard. It brought tears to his face as the lyrics began to play. “We're no strangers to love You know the rules and so do I A full commitment is what I'm thinking of You wouldn't get this from any other guy.” It played and the man began to bob his head to the song and began to sing along and dance horribly to the next part of lyrics. “I just wanna tell you how I'm feeling Gotta make you understand” he sang as he danced over to his next project. He sighed with success as he looked at it. “Alright, let’s get down to business… to defeat the Huns.” He said as he walked over to the box, turned down the music, and grabbed his gear to work on his next project.

Maybe make it’s larger weakness is that in the cold climates causes it to hibernate instead of just being less efficient. The reason for the Magmasaur has this and makes sense with this effect is because it’s a living furnace and can always maintain enough heat, just needing more work to maintain that heat. While this is more of a Lavasioth in interpretation, in that it covers itself in somewhat hardened or soft lava to maintain heat. So if it’s in cold environments, have it rapidly cool down the lava and slowly or otherwise gain torpor while in colder conditions. Maybe also instead of spewing a gold fire ball, have it more as a defensive play style instead compared to the Magmasaur. Taking reduced damage and at the same time dealing damage back passively. Maybe also make its melee deal fire damage per hit. Or adds a new mechanic that with each bite, stack pyrokenetic energy. And once fully charged. Allow it to start dealing fire damage with each bite over a short period of time. Or maybe it burps up Lava, keeping liquid lava in specially designed glands that allow it to burp short range attacks that deal fire damage and slow down opponents.

Paul Riddley stood there next to his newest tame that they acquired, a Ceratosaurus. She was young and honestly quite inexperienced and weak compared to what he had been riding for the past several months. ‘She may not be Brutus, but they sure great travel mounts.’ He thought as he mounted, The Scottish-American had ridden countless young and inexperienced horses where he was from but it was different riding an inexperienced dinosaur. He took a glance down at his wrist only to remember that he didn’t have a watch. He looked towards the blue sky, hating how it never changed. He hated having to worry about not knowing the time of day. Their Tek went dead on them a few hours after they arrived, three days ago. Erica said that Element would be easier to get here than on the Ark, but it would take time to get used to their new surroundings and strengthen their forces. They kept the armor, but Paul still missed being able to tell proper time everywhere he went and not guess at everything. “Quit worrying about Jonathan and Sylas, Paul. They're fine, probably squabbling but fine.” A voice said next to him, that would be his right-hand woman Erica Stevens. A woman who had a reserved past but who he’d been friends with since they met on that place’s beach 8 months ago. She was riding a trike that she named Taurus. “You make them sound like children. Do you mean squabble like arguing children or squabble like one having the other at knifepoint? And I’m also worried about Freya if you must know, this place seems more dangerous than the Ark we came from. We should have helped her on this hunt.” Paul said, Erica looked at him with a goofy concerned look. “You know that only happened twice with Jonathan in the beginning and Sylas was screaming like a chicken on both occasions.” Erica said, “And about Freya?” Paul asked, “Freya is an adult, Paul. She would’ve forced you to stay while she hunted by herself. To a point that she would knock you out.” Erica answered. “I suppose you're right on that, but you should have stayed back with Sylas and Jonathan to watch over them while I waited here.” “And listen to them bicker the entire time, why do you think I came along?” Erica said jokingly, Paul looked at her unamused. He sighed as he looked off into the distance of the vast wasteland. “What else is bothering you, Paul?” Erica said smiling, “Why didn’t you tell us? In the hallway to the arena… that one hologram, why didn’t you tell us that was our home now?” Paul said staring her down, Erica’s smile disappeared and she looked away. “It was irrelevant at the time.” “Irrelevant Erica?! The Earth hasn’t gotten dark since we got here?! The landscape of Earth is dead and so alien to what it normally was then?! The moon, the thing I looked at for its beauty for years is shattered into bloody pieces! How could you think it was irrelevant to anyone Erica?!” Paul confronted, “It was irrelevant because it was Paul!! We were being hunted by Priests of Mictlantecuhtli forces and their psycho leader so I didn’t really think about telling you!! Plus I had never seen or had to deal with those caves before so that was stressful in itself. Now yes, the Earth was dying from a war that happened before I was born, but only its ecosystem at my time. Earth had a rotation and the moon was fine, I didn’t know about any of the rest. But it doesn’t change the fact that Earth is dying unless we get that station down! And for that, we have to find the system.” Erica spat in anger, the two then sat there in silence as they waited for their friend for several minutes. Paul felt bad for chewing her out. He hated getting angry at people, but he felt misled by her telling them how to get down here but not being told what happened to Earth. However, he heard a noise in the distance but didn’t catch it and tried to listen to it again. “Look, Paul, I’m sorry that I-” “Pin yer lugs back.” Paul interrupted. “Paul, you know how I hate apologizing for anything, so can you please just let me-” She said before pausing, noticing that Paul’s hand was over his mouth in the quiet motion and pointed towards the wasteland. She listened for a moment before hearing a voice. “Paul, Erica!! I need help over here!” A voice’s shout echoed from the distance. It was Freya. The two looked at each other. “What do you think she wants?” Erica said, “I don’t know, but it would definitely be important.” Paul said. Then they rode their mounts as quickly as possible to get over to where they saw Freya go off to. Where they found the ground lowered into a Sulfur Field. They didn’t know where to go from there, but they didn’t have to know where. They heard shouting and yelling coming from the left side of the Sulfur Field. They began to rush towards the noise to see what was going on. As they got closer, they began to hear what the shouter was saying. “STOP SPEAKING LIKE THAT!! WHAT ARE YOU!?” The voice shouted in an unusual tone, almost panicked and unsettled they began to rush, and as they got to a ridge. They saw what was going on. There they saw Freya, hands in the air with her one Axe on the ground as she was trying to talk down a masked figure, with his face almost entirely covered. The man held a bow aiming at her head. Erica pulled from her saddle a long-neck rifle and aimed it at the assailant. Paul looked over at her and his eyes widened. “Erica, Don’t!!” He said a bit loud, a little too loudly as Freya and the masked person looked at them. Immediately the bow changed color to a red and his aim changed direction towards them. Erica lowered her rifle and scowled at Paul. “Way to go.” She growled, Paul glared at her but was interrupted by the masked person. “What are you things! Aliens? Ghosts? My Sanity? What Are You!!” The person yelled with the voice trembling, it sounded like a man from what Paul could tell. “What are you talking about? We’re like you? Humans, survivors. From the Arks.” Paul yelled back, “What?” The masked man said, “The Arks, a place you were before, one that was lusher than it is here?” Paul said, the man seemed to pull his bow harder back as he aimed. “Quit lying and tell me… What Are You?!” He said aimed it at Paul. Paul raised his hands in the air before he slowly put them on his saddle and dismounted. “What are you doing!?” Erica said aloud as Paul got off the Ceratosaurus and began walking with his hands in the air down a path that led him to the masked man. As he got closer, he could see the man was wearing armor similar to Tek, and his bow also seemed to be. However the dark lensed goggles and what looked like a futuristic bandanna didn’t seem to be Tek, though they were futuristic to some degree and they seemed to be attached to each other. His hair was dirty blonde and messy. While his aim and movement was that of stone on Paul. His breathing was shallow and rapid as Paul got closer. “D-D-Don’t get closer.” The man said, but Paul didn’t listen. He continued walking up to the man until he was only about 6 feet away. Paul lowered his hands and showed them to the man. He spun around slowly before facing the man once again. “We are just like you. It’s okay.” Paul said, the man looked at him, at first he seemed to not care. But he lowered his weapon and dropped it on the ground. Slowly, his breathing began to increase in volume and turned into hyperventilating. He ripped off his goggles and mask to get more air, revealing his face. He was young, early twenties or late teens. His deep green eyes were red and teary as he stared at Paul. “Please, please tell me your real? Please tell me I’m not imagining you all?” The man heaved, tearing as he did. Paul was confused by this question in its entirety, but the man was dead serious in asking the question. “Yes, yes we’re real.” He said, the man started crying as he balled up on the ground and began to cry. Paul was shocked by this reaction. He honestly wasn’t sure what to do. He looked over at Freya, she grabbed her axe off the ground and walked towards him. “He’s such a broken man. I could hear it through his voice.” She spoke, her mouth moving differently than what Paul heard. However, he had gotten used to it. “I’m s-sorry, I didn’t mean t- I’m so sorry.” The man began sobbing, repeating it over and over. “Hey, hey, It’s okay. You did no harm, so there isn’t anything wrong. Now yer looking a bit peely wally, sit here and rest.” Paul said kneeling next to him. The man looked confused still crying but he nodded in compliance. Paul got up to see Erica running down to them with her rifle in hand. He started walking toward her and Freya followed carrying her axe. They were outside of earshot of the man at this point. “So, what are we going to do with this guy?” Erica said, her tone serious and her face uneasy. “I Havnae a Scooby.” Paul said thoughtfully, he was replaying the scene that just happened in his head. “Well, I don’t think we should let him live.” Erica an “What? What harm has he done? I don’t think we should leave him alone. He’s in pain.” Freya argued, Erica scoffed at this. “He’s done a fair bit of harm. Especially since he’s in that armor and has that weapon. And you think it’s okay to let him into our tribe?” “Well, why not? He can be a useful ally.” “You’re too trusting in others, Freya.” Erica said irritated. “And you are too distrustful of others Erica. What could he do to us?” Freya said. “What if it’s a trap, what if he has allies and they are waiting to ambush our entire group? If they are all wearing what he is wearing, we’re all dead with no chance. That’s why we should kill him, we get the armor and gear and we would be a whole lot safer.” Erica said, Freya shook her head as she said this. “You’re being absurd Erica.” Freya said. “No, you are the only one who’s being absurd here Freya.” Erica said irritated, “Both of you, keep yer heids!” Paul shouted stepping into the argument. “Freya, you are being a bit too at ease here with this situation. It could be very well a trap.” Paul said, Erica huffed proudly, “Let me finish Erica. However, Freya, I agree with you.” Paul finished. “What?!” Erica said, “He’s having a breakdown Erica, and he isn’t faking it. And what it’s from that I’ve seen is believing that we weren’t and threatening to shoot us. He’s alone, and to be honest I don’t think it’s safe to leave him. Plus, he may have better experience in this world than any of us here.” Paul answered, “What experience?! I lived here!! We don’t need him.” Erica stated, “True, but you’ve even said it yourself that this place is different from when you were here. He may know this place better than you.” Paul stated, Erica scowled at him. “Are you doing this to get back at me?” She said irritated. “No, I’m doing this for our best chance at survival.” Paul fibbed, he knew that he did do it slightly because of that reason. He walked away from the other and went over to the man. He seemed a bit calmer. His breathing slowed and his sniffling more quieter. His nature seemed almost childlike. “Hey, you good?” Paul asked kindly, and the man nodded. “Do you mind if I ask you some questions?” Paul asked, the man shook his head. “I don’t mind, if you allow me to ask you some questions.” “Alright, let’s start with an easy question. Where were you f-” “Arat Prime Military Hospital, born 2353.” He said quietly, “Alright, what’s your name?” Paul asked, but the man stayed silent. Paul sighed to himself. “My name is Paul Riddley by the way. I don’t think we got on the right foot before.” Paul said, extending his hand out to the man. He looked at him for a moment before extending his hand out to shake. “Andrew.” “Andrew?” “Just Andrew, what’s the point in a last name when you don’t have anyone who would use it.” He said, he looked above him as though looking at someone else. Paul glanced over his shoulder to see Erica walking up, hoisting the rifle over her shoulder. She saluted them, showing her implant in her wrist and Paul nodded. He looked back to see the man confused at what had happened. He took this curiously as this was the first time a survivor took it as they didn’t know what it meant. “Alright, final what Ark did you first wake up from?” Paul asked. “What?” The man said, “Ark, you know. That place you were when you woke up?” Erica butted in. “The Camacho Forest?” “What? How- No, I mean the creature-infested, overgrown space stations? The Arks?” She continued, “I don’t follow. What Space Stations? What other places? The only places I’ve been before are a few small outcrops of ruined buildings and towns, Sanctuary, and Camacho International Forest. Nowhere else.” Andrew stated in frustration, Paul looked at Erica who seemed dumbfounded by this. And to Paul, he was just as confused by this. If he was a survivor, how did he get down here? “Could I ask my questions now?” Andrew asked, Paul broke free from his thoughts for a moment to answer. “Yeah, yeah. Go on.” “How can you understand her, are you both fluent in her language?” He asked, pointing to Freya who was beginning to harvest the carcasses. Paul shot a confused look at Andrew. “Don’t you?” “No, I couldn’t understand anything she said. It’s why I became so afraid of her. I didn’t know what she was saying or what she wanted.” “Isn’t your translator working?” “Translator?” “Aye, the one in your implant?” “Implant?” “Aye, the one in your left wrist.” He said, the man looked confused. “What implant?” “Here, let me see your wrist.” Paul said as he grabbed his wrist. “The one right here?” He continued before pausing in confusion. There was no implant. Nothing of the sort. “Erica, he doesn’t have one.” Paul said, “That’s impossible, everyone on the Arks has to have one.” “But I was never on these “Arks”. I was here on Earth ever since I woke up from Cryostasis.” Andrew said. “How then? How- Cryostasis? You were frozen?” She asked, he nodded. “For how long? And how long have you been awake since then?” She asked again. “I’ve been awake for just over 12 years. As for how long, I don’t know. The longest-running clock before dying that I’ve found has said just over a thousand years from when I went into Cryostasis.” He stated. “A thousand years?” Freya repeated. For Paul. A deep feeling in his gut dropped harder than anything he had ever felt. And he sure didn’t feel alone in this moment of grief and pain. As he knew both Freya and Erica had to have the same feelings.

I like it, however, I don’t know if they’ll allow it because of the name change. Obviously it’s based off the Axolotl, but it might be a bit too fantastical if you change the name from Axolotl to Magmaxolotl. And it may be a bit too close to the Magmasaur in some abilities. However other than that it’s really good!!

Andrew walked into the kitchen and grabbed any cooked meat that he had left in the fridge. He exited the kitchen went down the hallway to the front and grabbed a military backpack, his goggles, and a bandanna as he walked out the door and went behind the house. He stuffed all the meat that he grabbed inside the bag as he walked around the house to the back. Nothing mattered to him anymore except to avenge Reuben. And wouldn’t come back until the deed was done. He walked towards the shed, opened the door, and walked inside. He quickly went to the two containers of his parents and opened them up. In both were an array of weapons from his time. Everything Tek, from swords and knives to rifles and pistols to things he wasn’t sure what they were. He picked up one of two bracelets from his mom’s container and found it had a button on it. He put on the bracelet and pressed the button. Immediately a guard began forming around his wrist and lower hand, a blade shot out ahead of his hand. Andrew was amazed by this, it felt like it was pulsing through to his bones while activated. It felt energizing and powerful. But he deactivated it and put it back with the other. While it felt good, that he wouldn’t be able to wear his gauntlets while using them, it honestly felt like a bad design choice for a military weapon. He looked through his mother’s container again only to see more medical supplies and equipment, she really only had a shoulder cannon and the knife hands. He turned his attention to his dad’s container immediately seeing what he wanted, he pulled out a Tek bow and activated it. It immediately expanded out into the shape of a bow and a glowing string appeared from the bow and attached itself to the other side. It glowed an ominous cyan. Andrew adjusted his thumb and hit something by accident. A small holographic choice wheel appeared with four selections on it. Having regular arrows, combustible arrows, explosive arrows, and narcotic gas arrows. Andrew pressed the combustible arrow choice and the string color changed from cyan to orange. And the bow became a comfortable warm in his hand. He switched it back to the regular and it went back to normal. He deactivated it but kept it in his hand. This was something he was going to keep. He then looked at a knife in his dad’s container. At the moment, the blade was not there and it was only the handle sitting there. He grabbed and activated it and slowly an element blade began appearing out of the handle and forming into a military knife. He admired the translucent blade for a moment before deactivating it. He took a look one last time to see if he could possibly need anything else from inside either container. He then grabbed a Tek canteen and Tek Binoculars from his mom’s container before closing it up. He looked back at his dad’s container, and for a moment he stared at his dad’s helmet, where the call sign was. He had on the side of that helmet, Turok. For years he wondered what it meant, but never found anything in the books that he read. But to be honest, it wasn’t as important to him as it was years ago. Many of the mysteries behind his parents were never going to get answered. The only one that he wanted answered was why. Why do this to him and never wake him up? It’s haunted him for years and he’s never gotten a good answer that made sense. But that was an answer he would have to find some other time. He walked out of the shed with the stuff and began packing it inside the bag with the meat he had packed before. He checked the canteen to see how much water it would take to be filled up but to his surprise. It was already full. He took a sip and the water was perfectly fine and clean. Nothing wrong with it, he packed it in the pack with the weapons and headed off towards the teleporter. It was time for his pain to be vanquished. ~ Three days and nights passed as Andrew wandered through the wastelands surrounding Sanctuary. Every moment out there, he felt the weird feeling of being watched or even followed. But when he looked, he saw nothing. Just an empty Wasteland. It made him all the more uncomfortable to be there. He thought this wouldn’t take this long, so he followed the blood trail outside of the building. But the trail disappeared after a mile or so with no body or pools of blood nearby. He continued searching, but with each passing day, his anger for this beast grew and so did the pain of losing his friend. He felt guilt for everything that happened. It was his and the raptor’s fault. Killing the raptor in Reuben’s name would remove his guilt and suffering. But his anger kept building as he searched the raptor packs as he went along. Using his binoculars to spot them. But hadn’t yet found the raptors that killed Reuben. He wandered westward and stumbled into a sulfur field. The place was incredibly hot, hotter than anywhere he had been and the air didn’t smell all too good. He was about to desert the place quickly but he saw a pack of five raptors inside and decided to spot them. Andrew couldn’t believe his eyes when he saw a Raptor with a recent injury and a stubbed tail. He dropped the binoculars and quickly took off the backpack and dropped it to the ground. He opened it up, grabbed the bow, and activated it. With it expanding out and a cyan-blue string appearing. He was about two hundred yards away from the pack, a difficult shot with what weapon he had. But it was doable. Andrew drew his bow and a bolt of pure energy appeared on the arrow rest. As he did, auto-target activated and locked onto the head of the animal. Andrew pressed a button on the grip and the auto lock turned off. He aimed the bow for the creature’s ankles, he wanted it to see his face before it died. He waited for the right moment making some noise to catch its attention, the raptor stopped and looked for where the sound was. And Andrew took his shot. The bolt flew at impressive speed and hit the animal in the ankle, completely snapping it. The animal started screeching and howling in pain as the other four ran off in different directions. Andrew waited for a moment, he watched the animal struggle as it tried to get back on its feet only for it to collapse over again. Andrew watched this happen several times before having a good sense that it was clear for him to finish it off. He walked down towards the creature as it screeched and clawed at the ground trying to get up. As he walked into its sight though. The creature hissed and snarled, its eyes filled with unnatural fury and anger as Andrew got close to it, knowing who he was and what he was there for. Andrew drew the bow and shot it in the hips, debilitating it from moving its legs. His anger built up as he activated his knife and got close to it, cutting off its arms. He continued with his anger and vengeance, thrusting the knife into the beast’s chest and gutting the creature, the creature hissed and screeched even more. Andrew dropped the knife, pulled out his bow, and aimed it at the raptor’s head. But he paused and stared at the creature. The creature’s snarls and screeches began heaves and low-tone growls, its eyes were different than before and telling a different story. A story of pain and suffering, one of confusion and despair. Its eyes looked at Andrew before closing, preparing for its death and almost being at ease with it. But Andrew couldn’t do it, his anger turned to himself. He became a monster through his anger and pain. He stumbled back after realizing what he had done through his anger, breathing heavily. “What have I done…” He said aloud. Suddenly the creature began to lunge at him. Its eyes glowed magenta and were full of fury, and the beast snarled and began snapping at him. Andrew didn’t think and fear and instincts took over. He drew the bow and released the string. The bolt of energy flew straight into the head of the raptor and it dropped dead. Its head was fried and smoke came from the head. Andrew dropped to the ground and sat there, his emotions being pulled in every direction at the same time. He didn’t know what to think with all that was happening, but mostly guilt and pain hit him the hardest out of these emotions. He began hearing the echoing calls of the other raptors, their calls getting closer with each minute. Andrew quickly realized what was going on and got up as he tried to escape. Only to find himself surrounded by four raptors, all of them beginning to circle calculating an attack. Andrew drew his bow and fired his first shot, dropping the first one. Two of the others came in charging and Andrew sifted three bolts at one of them, dropping it on the third. The third raptor came in fast and Andrew drew the bow fast and fired a shot straight at the creature’s head. Dropping it three feet away from him. Andrew quickly looked around in front of him for the fourth. As he did, a powerful hit came from behind him, launching him into the ground face-first. He flipped over onto his back only to see a raptor a few feet away from him. He tried to scuttle back, but the raptor lunged at him. Andrew thrusted his bow in front of him with both hands on it to block the raptor from getting to his face and both got into a stalemate. Andrew held the bow to its neck and its arms as the head of the beast was only a foot away from his head. Andrew let out a yell out of instinct, releasing his anger, pain, and fury all out. Andrew could feel the raptor’s foot push down on his chest and heard the claw try to pierce the armor but was too weak to pierce it. He tried to adjust one of his hands towards the string but the animal felt its tension ease and tried to push downward, Andrew tried and succeeded at regaining a grip on the bow with his other hand. Leaving the distance between their faces only a few inches apart. Andrew could feel the hot, disgusting breath and saliva of the creature fall on his face. His strength began to fail him and the creature kept moving in centimeter by centimeter. Andrew felt like a failure to his friend even more. All he wanted was to make something right for his friend but he failed at that. Tears began rolling down his face. ‘I don’t deserve to be alive, I should’ve been the one to die there, Reuben. All I’ve done since is cause pain. Forgive me for what I’ve done.’ He thought, he looked at the raptor above him. Its eye’s magenta, it almost looked like it had a smile across its face as it knew it was winning. Andrew screamed out just in anger at himself. And slowly letting the bow come down towards his face. With the creature snapping more vigorously with each centimeter passing. The creature jerked its head up as was about to try to force the arms down faster. Then Andrew heard a loud thud and the raptor above him jerked, squealed, and screeched in pain. It turned around away from Andrew and started hissing and snarling at something there. Andrew scuttled back and saw a Battle Axe sticking out of the back of the raptor. He watched as the beast charged at whatever it was, and then another thud, and the creature reared up and howled in pain. Then a sudden halt in the howl as Andrew watched the head and neck slide off the body and both fell to the ground with something standing over it with an axe in its hand. A human, a woman with blonde hair wearing fur armor and desert-built pants. She bent over grabbing the battle axe from the back of the creature and slipping it into a loop hanging from a belt. She looked over at Andrew and smiled with a kind face. “Jeg hørte noen rop fra andre siden av dalen og fulgte etter den. Det så virkelig ut som du trengte en hånd. Paul, Erica! Kom raskt, jeg har funnet noen! Navnet er Freya, hva er ditt?” The woman said to Andrew, but he couldn’t understand it. Andrew’s eyes widened with fear. He knew his mind was already on the verge of losing it, but he didn’t think it was this close ‘This can’t be real, it’s just impossible. I’ve looked everywhere across Sanctuary and the surrounding area for years and never found anyone. Am I dead? Is this some sort of torment or alien encounter?’ He thought to himself. The woman saw that he was in distress. “Hei, går det bra med deg? Paul, Erica! Jeg trenger hjelp her! Det er, greit at vi skal hjelpe deg uansett hva du trenger!” The woman said, he couldn’t understand her still. She started getting closer to Andrew. Andrew’s eyes widened even more and he stood up immediately and aimed his bow for her. She lowered her axe and raised her hands in the air. She tried to say something but Andrew cut her off. “Who are you, what are you!” He said scared, he was trembling from everything that happened and was going on. She said something but again he couldn’t understand. “I don’t understand, I don’t understand what you’re saying. WHAT ARE YOU?” He shouted with a trembling voice.

Andrew grabbed the shotgun off the ground and pulled the trigger. Blowing off the raptor's tail in view. The creature screamed out in pain and left his view. Andrew crawled out of the crevice with shotgun in hand and looked the way the raptor went only to see it go around the corner. “Where are you going!! Coward!!” Andrew screamed, but a snarl came from behind him. Andrew looked around and saw another raptor coming around the other side. It charged towards him, however, he didn’t run and instead began walking towards it shotgun aimed at it. He fired his weapon and the creature staggered, but Andrew continued pushing towards the creature and fired again and again. It dropped on the floor only a few feet from Andrew with its skull and neck disfigured. Red blood and Magenta liquid pools began to form around the body. Andrew thought it was unusual that the pools didn’t mix together but instead separated when leaving the body. He looked around and only saw the three bodies lying on the ground. He saw a blood trail that was from the fourth raptor and began following it, shotgun to his shoulder. However, following it led him to the hallway and outside where the blood trail disappeared. Andrew was furious that he didn’t get it, he was ready to yell at the top of his lungs. He walked back to where he was and picked up his rifle. He saw the two raptors that lay there, how much he wished it was three. He turned around to see Reuben’s lifeless body on the ground. No movement, no breathing, lifeless. A pool of blood built around him and had a gash on his side and on his throat. Andrew knelt down looked and grabbed him, his eyes wide and lifeless. Andrew's hands turned red from the blood, but he didn’t care. Andrew’s eyes watered underneath the goggles and he began having a hard time breathing with the bandanna over his face. He took both off and began crying the hardest he had in a very long time. Why couldn’t he have saved him, why did he freeze… Why did he not pull the gun out faster? He thought of these questions as he held his best friend’s body in his arms. He cried holding him for what seemed like nearly an hour. He looked down at Reuben, tears running down his face and his nose running. He seemed more peaceful in his death than what he expected from what happened. Andrew gently lowered Reuben’s body, tears still ran down his face. He didn’t deserve to rest here as his resting place. He went around quickly looking for something in one of the crates he’d seen before. A painting blanket, after looking in several crates, he finally found it. He went back to Reuben and wrapped him up in it. Andrew quickly looked around for a shovel and found one in the War and Military History Museum storage container. Andrew came back to the wrapped body and looked down at it while putting on his goggles and bandanna. “Forgive me for failing you.” Andrew said as he put the shovel in with the wrapped body. As he got ready to pick it up, he paused. He was missing something still, he went around looking through the crates and found an art piece of a cross, and in another crate found a hammer. He went back into the War Museum container and found a knife and began carving words into it. He came back and put the cross and hammer in with the wrapped body, picked it up, and began his way to find a resting place for his best friend… * * * * With a flash, Andrew was back home alone. This was the worst day for him he’d ever had. He took a step off the teleporter and dropped the hammer and shovel he had in his hands. He saw Tracy grazing close to his house and walked right past her. “Not right now Tracy.” Andrew said quietly. Everything for him was now becoming distant as if he was watching himself from the outside. He could hear his breath echoing as he walked towards and opened the door to his parent's house. He took off his goggles and bandanna and saw he had blood on both. He looked at his hands and saw the dried blood stains on his hands and forearms. He began switching off the Tek armor and took off all the pieces. Andrew walked into the living room collapsed onto the couch and cried. He was genuinely alone for the first time from everyone and everything he ever knew. All his family and friends were gone. His best friend died for the longest to his doing. All he could do was remember him. As he thought about Reuben, his mind began to wander to his parents, his friends, and Rue. But instead of vivid memories and warm moments, he couldn’t remember. He couldn’t remember how they looked or what they felt like. All he could remember was their voices and even those were hard to remember correctly. He quickly got up and began tearing the house apart for something, anything that had a photo, audio, or video clips on one of the computers of his family and friends. He searched almost every room in the house but found nothing. He walked into the hallway and looked at a closed door. A door he hadn’t entered since he awoken. He began to reach for the door and grabbed it, his heart pumping fast as he turned the doorknob and opened it. Dust began filling the air lightly as he did so. He looked inside and began having smaller, vivid memories of them. He hugged his mother, his dad teaching him how to shoot. Playing chess and other board games with them, them helping him with school. Their voices became stronger and more recognizable to him. But he still couldn’t remember what his parent’s faces looked like. He began searching the room for anything with pictures. Dust began flying and filling the air, but he didn’t care. He coughed his way through looking for anything with their faces on it. But again, nothing. He couldn’t find anything, he checked twice, even three times for a scrapbook. He knew his mom kept one, she liked doing things old-fashioned like that. But there was nothing. Andrew couldn’t breathe anymore with how much dust and began running out of the room and slammed the door behind him before he collapsed on the ground, heaving and coughing that slowly turned into wails and tears as he couldn’t remember anyone from his life before, all he could remember was their voices, painful voices with no face to them. He pounded his fists against the floor. His wailing got worse as realization hit him. He was alone and forgotten, and he would die alone. His crying began to quiet down and he got himself up off the ground and sat down against the wall. Fear and regret filled him, tears still running down his face. All of these thoughts began to break him down, he no longer was able to think of anything else but his mistakes and how it was all his fault for getting Reuben killed. Hate for himself began building, that he deserved this pain for his mistakes and deserved everything that happened. But did Reuben? Did Reuben deserve to die for Andrew’s mistakes, no. But maybe it was a mercy for him, maybe it was something that he- ‘No, it wasn’t something he deserved either way, it was no mercy for him to die to that raptor. I should’ve killed that thing as soon as I saw it. It should be dead instead of Reuben.’ Andrew’s thought, his hate for himself began to obsess over that raptor. That it deserved death, it deserves the death Reuben had, no a worse death. Agonizing suffering and pain with no peaceful end. Hate for himself became hate for that beast and he filled with rage. Revenge filled his heart. Revenge became his reason to stand. Revenge was his only motivation to continue on. Revenge for Reuben was all that mattered to him.

Andrew walked quietly through the rows and rows of stacked crates. In some cases, these stacks were taller than he was. Andrew didn’t like how quiet it was, his heart was beating in his head with the adrenaline and fear. A raptor came around the corner in front of Andrew and Andrew jumped, losing a slight grip on his rifle. The looked at him and snarled, it then charged at Andrew. Andrew aimed his rifle and pulled the trigger, only to hear a fear-filling click. He looked down at his gun and pressed it again to hear the same thing. Andrew looked back up and saw the raptor only a few feet away. “Oh, crap...” Andrew said to himself and threw his rifle at the creature and jumped out of the way as the raptor did a blind lunge at him, missing him entirely and falling on its side. Andrew panicked and quickly looked around for a hiding space, he found a crevice in between several crates that was large enough for Andrew to go into. Andrew quickly slid in there but tripped on his own foot in panic. He stumbled and hit his head against a crate and fell onto his hands and knees. Andrew crawled to the very back of the crevice which was not very deep as he found out. He turned his back to the crates to see where the raptor was. As he did this, he saw the raptor peer in the crevice, it stared at him with soul-piercing eyes. It soon began trying to make its way into the crevice with its head, neck, and arms fitting inside, but its body was too large for it to fit through. It snapped at Andrew, its face only a more determined snap away from Andrew’s feet and legs. Andrew could only hear the raptor snapping. Andrew tried to scoot further back, but he was already against the back of the crevice. He tried pulling the shotgun off of his back, but he was panicking and wasn’t able to get it off his back unless he scooted forward. But he didn’t want to dare a chance. The raptor backed out and prepared for another jump towards Andrew. He closed his eyes, afraid this was the end for him. But he heard a bark and a screech. He opened his eyes to see something surprising. Reuben gripped the raptor with his teeth by the raptor’s throat. The raptor’s calls were getting more shrill. Reuben's jaws snapped shut around the raptor's throat, with blood dripping around Reuben’s mouth. The raptor panicked even more knowing what was going to happen. It tried rolling to get Reuben off, bashing Reuben against crates, but Reuben didn’t budge. It didn’t take long after that for the raptor’s life to leave its eyes and drop down and have no more movement. Once he knew it was gone, Reuben let go of the throat and looked over to Andrew. His tail wagged so hard and his eyes were wide with joy. Andrew was surprised to see Reuben outside of the crate. He must’ve pushed the lid off of it to come help him. Andrew didn’t care though, he was so happy to see him. He smiled and tears of joy ran down his face. Andrew scooted forward took the shotgun off his shoulder and got up to his knees. He looked up at Reuben who was still looking at Andrew with his tail still wagging. “Come here, boy!!” Andrew whispered with a frail joy in his voice, Reuben took a step but then stopped for some reason. He quickly looked to his side before getting kicked by a powerful and deadly leg, Reuben’s yipe as it happened made it all the much worse. Andrew's tears went from joy to pain and fear as he watched in horror as a raptor emerged into his view. Its eyes glowed with an unnatural magenta. It walked out of view as quickly as it walked in view. It stopped though, only leaving part of its tail in Andrew’s view. Andrew was frozen, he wasn’t able to believe what happened. His mind wouldn’t let him move, his mind held him captive in pain and fear. He heard Reuben yipe a second time. Hearing Reuben yipe again freed him from his mind and Andrew lost it with rage.

Andrew and Reuben quickly hunkered down behind a couple of crates. Andrew peered around from the crates and saw four raptors exiting the shadows of the hall. They looked around and called to each other, their calls much more distorted than their normal counterparts. ‘Damn it, could this get any worse!!’ Andrew yelled in his thoughts. Andrew looked at Reuben, he seemed frightened. Andrew looked over in one of the corners where there was one of Andrew’s contingency plans that were set up for such a situation. Several empty crates, one being tipped to the side and lid off of it. He looked back at Reuben and quickly gave a command. “Reuben, army crawl to block.” Andrew said quietly, which didn’t bother Reuben as he did a dog’s army crawl to the crate and lay inside. Andrew sighed, now all he had to do was get there safely, close Reuben’s box and get in his without catching the attention of the raptors. Andrew army crawled slowly to the boxes checking his surroundings frequently. He got to Reuben’s box and peered inside Reuben turned his head and looked at him. “See you on the other side of this buddy!” Andrew said quietly as he grabbed the lid of the crate and gently and quietly set it over the hole, pressing against it to make sure it was sealed enough for the lid not to fall off yet loose enough for Reuben to still be able to breathe. Andrew let go of the lid, and it stayed in place. Andrew crawled over to his crate next, a crate as big as Andrew standing. It was standing straight up, which turned out inconvenient in times of emergencies. Andrew looked around for a moment, he couldn’t see the raptors. He heard chattering of them communicating as they began to search but no sight of them yet. Andrew slowly and quietly stood up next to the crate. He looked around and still didn’t see any of the raptors from this angle. Andrew quickly grabbed the top of the crate and quietly as possible set it down on its side next to Reuben’s. Andrew quietly walked around it to the top and took off the lid. He quickly realized that he still had guns on his back and took them off and putting individually in. He gently set the shotgun inside, but as he was about to put his rifle in, something happened. The earth began to shake and a thunderous sound blasted through the air with an unearthly pulsing hum coming along with it. This was the first time Andrew or Reuben had ever experienced something like this. Out of the hundreds of expeditions to this place. This was the first time. It terrified Andrew and horrified Reuben. As this was occurring, Reuben began barking and yipping loudly and the crate he was in began shaking as he panicked inside. Andrew tried to shush him up, but it was a waste of time and energy. Two heads popped up from behind crates and looked over in Andrew’s direction, almost immediately spotting him crouched by the crate. Andrew quickly thought for a moment and ran with his rifle away around the edge of the crates. Trying his best to get their attention and leave Reuben safe. This plan worked as calls for the hunt rang through that facility and the sound of fast pace movement of claws. However, it didn’t work as he planned as a raptor almost immediately blocked his way through. Andrew stopped and aimed his rifle. The creature began running towards him and Andrew started firing. Andrew fired six rounds into its chest and the creature dropped five feet away from him. Andrew looked down at the creature, gaping its last breath before exhaling and its eyes widened. The room and the outside world become immediately silent. The strange noise was over and nothing was louder than a mouse. Andrew knew he didn’t have the element of surprise anymore and probably had no chance of making it out. Andrew quickly turned and ran back to the crate and grabbed the shotgun. Killing them was the only way out for him and Reuben. He slung the shotgun over his left shoulder pushed the rifle to his right shoulder and began to search for these monsters.

Andrew and Reuben walked for miles, getting ever so closer to one of the domes. Yet he wasn’t going there. He continued following a path that led him between the dome and Sanctuary. He heard a screech coming from ahead and both Reuben and him ducked into some bushes. Coming up the path was a raptor, however it was running away from what Andrew was trying to hide from. Several other raptors were chasing it, these were different, however. A strange vine-like material covered them, it glowed an ominous purple color. They hunted and killed everything, no matter if it was their own kind. They were monsters, no longer animals with natural instincts. Their instinct was only to kill and destroy. Andrew watched as four of these raptors chased the one and continued chasing it out of his sight. Andrew and Reuben slowly walked out of the bushes, Reuben started shaking off branches and thorns that got stuck in his fur and hide. “Come on boy, let’s get to where we need to go.” Andrew said as he walked down the path. Andrew and Reuben only had to walk a little while further were. He could see what he was looking for just ahead of them. A back of a large building, halfway buried under the dust and element that surrounded this place. The exterior building was rusted out with several small openings on the outer layer of the roof and walls. Andrew walked around the building, passing what looked like a main entrance to the building, and went to two large doors below that with one that was slightly cracked open. Andrew pulled with all his might and opened the door. Darkness welcomed them, something quite rare for this place. And with hesitation, Andrew and Reuben walked inside. Andrew stumbled his way through the huge corridor, feeling the right wall of the hall until it fell away to the side. Andrew turned and started searching the wall for something until he felt a large, industrial switch. Andrew grabbed it and flipped it. Light started to fill the light-absent room, revealing an extremely large storage facility. With rows after rows of crates and even a few cargo containers. Further in the back was a large elevator for transporting crates and containers. This place was massive, and Andrew was barely scratching the surface for the past month. ‘Was it only a month? Has it been longer or even possibly shorter?’ Andrew thought, it was getting harder to keep track of days as he got older and the longer and longer he awoken from the pod. He looked for Reuben for a second and saw that he began wandering the rows of crates. Andrew grabbed an old crowbar off the floor. “Alright, time to get to work.” * * * * Less than an hour passed as Andrew opened crates finding very little to practically nothing useful. He was getting discouraged from the nonsense he found in just this one crate. It was all a bunch of magazines on properties, places like Pandora’s Paradise Resort of the Caesar Estate and The Moonflight Building. Why was this stuff even stored? Was this stuff really that important? Andrew didn’t think so, most of these places didn’t even exist anymore. Most of these crates had random stuff, and very little of it has been useful for survival. Some mapping equipment and useful books like survival guides and encyclopedias all except for an elusive dinosaur encyclopedia. But he needed other things to survive. Ammunition was getting tighter for him, and Element was too. He needed to find these things to keep his chances of surviving high. Without them, his chances drop significantly. So he continued searching and after several more crates of junk and ‘Library Archives’, he quit and went over to one of the locked cargo containers instead. The container had old, washed-away paint on it from where it was at, Andrew couldn’t read it all but he could see it was URE. Other letters were scattered across the side with Ms, an H, a W, and a couple of As with one next to the W. He broke the lock and opened the container, inside were several more crates and smaller containers, and stacks of cases. Andrew walked inside and opened one of the cases and saw an old-fashioned rifle made of metal and wood. Something Andrew had never seen before, with a weird switch by where you normally loaded the ammunition. Andrew closed it and took the case off and opened it at the next one. The gun in this case was also wood and metal, but instead of a switch where you loaded it, there was a looped lever by the trigger and an angled hole to the side of the gun. Andrew closed up the case and broke open a crate, inside was ammunition for all sorts of weapons. Then finally Andrew looked at the side of the crate and read what it said. “URE War and Military History Museum.” Andrew said out loud with a hysterical laugh as it finally made sense what this place was. It was a historical archive. Andrew quickly got out of the container and ran to the back of the storage facility where the elevator was and looked for levels. The sign for the levels was made of metal and was engraved with the levels of the building. There were about twenty, the first eight being human history and one being a news archive. Several others being for sciences and other things. Andrew turned around with a big smile on his face. Reuben was sitting behind him, tail wagging. Andrew knelt down and started rubbing him with excitement. “Reuben, they have a news archive!! Maybe we can find out what happened since we were asleep. It has been… many years-” Andrew said cutting himself off as he noticed a couple of sticky spots on Reuben. Andrew lifted his hand off of him and noticed there was a little bit of blood on his hands. He was cut in several places. Andrew could only assume that he was cut up from the thorns and branches. Which were on a used game trail by dinosaurs. Andrew realized he forgot to close the doo- A terrifying, echoing call came from outside the storage room and somewhere beyond the hall. —————————————————— Author Note: To those reading Ultimus, due to new Lore related new with the Armadoggo coming to Extinction. I will be rereleasing several revised chapters in the coming weeks. Reuben however will not change from him being a Rottweiler. Most changes will just be revising his explanation of why he’s not an Armadoggo and just some more minor revisions. Nothing majorly plot changing. I hope you are all enjoying this!!!

An alarm clock started going off and Andrew opened his eyes dully to the sound of it. He just had a memory dream, remembering when he first woke up all the way to finding his way to Sanctuary. All of it played out in what felt like a few minutes. It all felt to him that it was only a moment ago. Yet he knew that wasn’t true. Twelve years had passed since the day he awoke from the cold sleeping pod and the day he exited that tunnel. He felt so hopeful of finding others, that there was a chance that others were alive. How that hope was crushed when he saw Sanctuary and the state it was in. No one had been there, no human life for who knows how long. Andrew sat up and turned in his bed so that he was sitting on it. He looked to his left at the nightstand, his Element Corp. alarm clock was still going off. Andrew grabbed it and shut off the alarm. He ran his hands through this hair. He raised his head slightly and looked around the room. Books covered the floor of his room, everything from world encyclopedias to how-to books to even complete science fiction and comic books. He looked over at a corner of his room where a child’s mattress lay. Laying on top of that was Reuben, while being Twelve years old, he acted and looked half his age. Being extremely healthy and spry for the age he was, he was starting to have a patch of grey fur come in around his muzzle. Reuben raised his head and looked at Andrew with a happy expression. Andrew chuckled and smiled at this, the person he trusted the most for most of his life wasn’t even a person and he loved it. “Good Morning Reuben.” Andrew said, he began hearing the rhythmic thumping of Reuben’s tail against the child’s mattress. Andrew got up and looked down at his pajamas. They were an old pair of his father’s. On his dad, they would’ve fit perfectly, but on Andrew they were floods. Andrew was surprisingly taller than his father by now and couldn’t believe it himself that he was this tall. Andrew then looked at his closet, where he kept the tek suit that was once his father’s too. He stared into space beginning to think about his parents before shaking his head. He dare not think about them. He didn’t feel he needed to think about them or those he loved and lost so many years ago. To those he never said goodbye to. He shook his head again, trying to repress and forget memories that attempted to come back. He needed to get out, and he knew just the thing. He walked over to Reuben and kept down and began stroking him. “Time to get to work.” Andrew said. * * * * Andrew walked down the hallway towards the front door fully dressed with his suit on and ready for the day. He stopped at a wardrobe that was in the hallway and opened it. Inside was a rifle and shotgun, a bandanna, a pair of tinted motorcycle goggles, some other survival gear, and a flashlight. He put on the Bandanna and Goggles, put the two guns on each of his shoulders, and grabbed the flashlight. He looked back and saw Reuben walking down the hallway, stretching as he did so. Andrew turned around and opened the door and walked outside. What was once an overgrown abandoned roadway in the Forest was now a well-maintained driveway and yard. Andrew put several days and possibly nights into cleaning it up. He felt that it was the right thing to do if he was going to live here. In his front yard was a teleportation pad. He hulled it back with one of the ATVs when he first got back from Sanctuary so many years ago. He had found some element inside the house and was able to activate it. And since then, he has been using it almost every day. He began walking over to it when heard a noise to his right. He looked over to see that same dinosaur, though she now had young and her scales were duller. It still grazed and raised its young near his house. Andrew smiled at her, though not knowing what she was, he felt he had to give her a name. And so he named her Tracy. “Good morning Tracy!! How’s the family doing today?” Andrew said. The dinosaur grazed on the ferns and bushes and seemed to ignore him. However, Andrew nodded and chuckled. “Darn kids are being trouble to you huh? Well if you need to, send them over here to spend the night so you can get some rest. Me and Reuben can have them all straightened out by the next morning.” Andrew said, she continued grazing. “Alright, if you feel that isn’t a fit enough punishment for them. I just wanted to give you a break. Well hey, I gotta run. I hope you have a good day!” Andrew said as he walked towards the teleportation pad. He looked over to it and saw Reuben. “Sorry Reuben, she’s such a chatterbox. I was trying to get away but she continued talking.” He felt like he lost it a bit. Talking to a dinosaur or his dog and imagining what they would say back to him. He started doing this a month after he woke up, trying to make sure he wouldn’t go crazy from the isolation. Yet he felt silly and even more crazy doing this every day. He walked onto the pad and made sure it was set to the correct destination and then pressed it. In a flash, he and Reuben were in the dark. Immediately Andrew turned on the flashlight and looked around, he was in the subway station. It didn’t look like a subway station anymore but instead a large hotel room with furniture and carpets. He walked over to a corner that had an element lantern there and he turned it to its brightest setting. It lit up the entire room and part of the tunnel. Andrew jumped down into the tunnel and helped Reuben gently get down too. He began walking down the tunnel and to where the edge of the light was casting away the darkness. There stood a stool with another element lantern on top of it. Andrew grabbed the lantern, turned it on, and carried it as continued to walk down into the tunnel. He continued walking down the tunnel until he could see another stool and a bright light coming from the end of the tunnel. He walked over to the stool and set the lantern on it and turned it off. He looked to the exit of the tunnel and slowly slid through the crevice with Reuben close behind. Andrew and Reuben reached the other side where they found themselves in a dead end of sorts. This dead-end leads to a path on the cliffside of a mountain. “Remember Reuben, be careful. You don’t want to have bad footing and slip here.” Andrew said looking at his dog. They cautiously walked the path down the mountain, and as they reached the bottom of the mountain. They passed a strange row of what looked like radio towers. Andrew never understood what they were and why they were there. And he’d probably never know. “Just like Stonehenge for us I guess, don’t you think Reuben?” Andrew said softly. He didn’t want to say it louder for fear. He looked out for what was ahead and saw a barren wasteland, with the remnants of what once was here and the oddities they left behind. With strange domes he dare not go near and beings in the ruins of the city that lost their ways. Out here though he dared not speak or even breathe heavily in fear of what was here. As this place, was death itself. Where the dead live and breathe, and the living come to die. This place, that was once known as Sanctuary. But Andrew needed to come here. Not for the chance to find others, as that hope died the day he saw this place. But for the chance to find things to further his chances of survival. And so he and Reuben continued their trek down the mountain and through the ominous passes to where he needed to go.

The Dreadmare looks AWESOME!!!!! And it makes the Pyromane male in comparison!!!! I can’t wait to get this!!!