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Then the slit shifted, from me to Talan and back again.
And then the wholemountainshifted.
I watched with undisguised horror as the “mountain” began to wake from its slumber.
It wasn’t a mountain at all.
It was a giant monster.
The scales on its skin, once mistaken for rocky terrain, now gleamed in the dying light of the day.
The world around us shifted, and the very ground beneath our feet trembled.
The creature stirred, and as it did, we were treated to a sight of its full magnitude.
Massive legs, each as wide as a building, shifted as the creature started to rise.
Long, sinewy necks — for there were more than one — stretched upwards, their heads reaching for the sky.
Multiple eyes, each different in size and hue, scanned the surroundings, settling on us with an intensity that made my heart stop.
For a brief moment, time froze.
There was just Talan and me, our hands still joined, staring up at this alien leviathan that towered over us.
But then, instincts kicked in.
Talan’s grip on my hand tightened, and without a word, we did the only thing that made sense.
We ran.
* * *
The world around us became a blur, every sensation intensified by the terror of the moment.
Talan’s fingers were laced tightly with mine, and the unity of our sprint was almost rhythmic, every footfall in harmony.
But the mounting dread within me was impossible to ignore.
It was my partner’s valiant efforts to free us that had roused this immense creature, and that weight of responsibility pressed heavily on my shoulders.
We couldn’t see the beast, the dense jungle obstructing our view.
But even without a direct line of sight, its proximity was chillingly apparent.
Each footstep it took seemed to resonate in my very bones, a thunderous stomp that left no doubt about the size of the creature chasing us.
The familiar imagery of a multi-headed T-Rex danced in my mind, a relic of Earth’s past, but I had no way of knowing if this creature bore any true resemblance.
Its terror was wholly its own.
The cacophony of the creature’s pursuit was harrowing — the crunching and snapping of trees, the rustling of underbrush, and that ceaseless roar that seemed to grow louder with every second.
Its hunger was palpable, driving us to push our bodies to the brink of exhaustion.
“Left!” Talan yelled, pulling me sharply to the side as we veered around a particularly large tree.
But no sooner had we turned than another deafening roar echoed to our right.
