What the hell just happened? That was all Triceracop kept thinking as he clenched a gloved hand against his throat. It didn't stop the blood from pulsing between his fingers. Already a shockingly wide pool had formed in the dirt next to his face. He was on the ground somehow. Although he couldn't see the gash, the pain told him the wound was deep. He rolled onto his back and stared up at a stretch of spotless blue sky.
His usually methodical mind sped frantically through the possibilities—like someone groping for an exit in a smoke-filled building. He had to do something. Anything. But what? The phrase What the hell just happened? kept echoing in his head uselessly, while blood kept spurting between his fingers. Adrenaline surged through his system, his heart beat faster. He tried to call out. No good. Blood squirted several inches into the air and sprinkled his face. Carotid artery...
He was pressing on his neck so hard he was almost strangling himself. And he'd been feeling so good just moments before that. He remembered that much at least. His last debts repaid. At long last.
He was getting calmer now. His vision blurred and the world around him started to slow down. He tried to remember what he'd been doing before this, but all that came to mind was darkness. Pure darkness.
Slowly, consciousness slipped away as the phrase What the hell just happened echoed in his mind one last time.
30 minutes earlier
Bikes. I love bikes. Really I just love anything with wheels, thought Triceracop—or should I say Prophet Orpheus—as he panted during his morning jog. The real Triceracop's body still hadn't been dug up from deep in the hot Nevada desert.
Though fans over the nation would be disappointed at the best selling author's sudden disappearance, Orpheus knew better. Triceracop's aledged booksigning tour was a cover for scouting out locations for the INFINI-cano, a super volcano Triceracop planned to use to power his franchise of Dino-lent, an alternative liquid diet that was made for dinosaurs, by dinosaurs. What the populace didn't know though, was it was made for dinosaurs, by dinosaurs, OF dinosaurs. In fact, Triceracop tried to make Orpheus into Dino-lent just hours before celebrating Christmas together as a family.
For weeks after, Prophet Orpheus followed Triceracop around the country for weeks and finally located Triceracop's motel in Reno earlier that morning. He decided to make his move at midnight. The act would be swift and simple. Death by asteroid.
After the fateful act, leaving nothing but a gaping crater in what was once Reno, he assumed Triceracop's identity and plotted to be the best looking dinosaur on the west coast. There was only one problem: he didn't have Triceracop's lean, muscular figure. So he tried everything to lose weight. He went on dinosaur diets. Nothing. Did dinosaur exercise programs. Nothing. Tried Dino-lent. No improvement. Bought dinosaur cleanses. No luck. Even the paleo diet. But, alas, nothing. Nothing was working.
So he resorted to jogging. Every morning, after forcing himself out of the comfort of his bed, Prophet Orpheus would slip into skin-tight, dino running gear, and go for a run around the INFINI-crater—what he named what had so recently been Reno.
That fateful morning, something was watching...
To be continued...
IMMEDIATLY.
The red-tailed hawk spread its wings and banked left, catching a warm updraft from the edge of the crater. The swell carried it another 50 feet in altitude. It scanned the air below it for potential prey. A green dot traveled along a running trail.
Prophet Orpheus saw a shadow cross the ground and looked up. The sun glared in his vision, forcing him to squint his eyes to make out the silouette of the hawk flying overhead. He kept jogging while looking at the bird. Unfortunatly for him, Orpheus hadn't seen the cliff ahead. He collided neck-first with the jagged rock before toppling to the ground.
What the hell just happened?