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Chapter 1

The Early Cretaceous Period

The sun was shining in a bright blue cloudless sky over a lush valley. The wind was whistling through the tall grasses in the grassy plains areas within the valley. The water-retaining plants and plentiful small ponds worked perfectly to keep the valley lush with all sorts of plant life. Large herds of herbivores always either nest in this valley or at the very least pass through on migration. Herds of sauropods, hadrosaurs, and ceratopsians were happy to graze upon the grasses of the plains. The forests of the valley provided hiding places, nesting sites, and refuge for those that were small enough to walk between the trees. The two mountains the valley was nestled between had tall cliffs that were good nesting sites for various species of pterosaurs.

Carnivores were attracted to the abundance of herbivores in this valley. Sure there were large theropods like Tyrannosaurus rex, but it was the smaller pack-hunters that really put the herbivores on edge. Since they were smaller and stealthier, they could sneak up on unsuspecting herbivores and attack without a sound. The herbivores had nightmares about these predators.

And it was a pack of such predators that was currently stalking a herd of hadrosaurs. This was a pack that was recently formed by those who were fresh out of the nest, themselves. These were Utahraptors, one of the largest of their family line. They had recently established a nest in one of the valley's forests. Their dark green feathers had a pattern of black stripes to act as camouflage in both the forests and the grasslands.

The alpha of this specific pack was a female named Vora. She was an alpha in terms of her raw strength and her personality. She had a scar over her left eye that she wore with honor after receiving it in a fight with another alpha from a rival pack. Vora took pride in her ability to be the alpha of her pack.

Females were the ones in charge in Utahraptor packs, with a single alpha female that is in charge of everything. Under her are her sisters, female offspring, or subordinate females that were ousted from other packs. And lastly, there were the males. The males were easily recognizable by their smaller size and black head crests. Females choose what males to mate with and once a female chooses a mate, it's for life. Normally, the entire pack would do the hunting, but during the nesting season when the females are preoccupied with guarding the eggs, the males go out and do the hunting. When the offspring grow up, they leave their old territory to find their own mates and territory and either start their own packs or join another pack. Vora's pack was made up of eight individuals, including herself. Her pack had three other females and four males. The females were all her sisters.

Currently, Vora and her pack were spread out around un unaware herd of hadrosaurs. Vora didn't know what species these particular ones were, but she didn't care. These ones were muscular, but their meat had just the right amount of fat that made it more flavorful and chewy. That fact alone made the effort of hunting them so worth it.

To her left, her younger sister Mara joined her side. She was the smallest of her sisters but she was the fastest and most agile of the pack. She had more optimism than most of the pack. Mara was also the most excited to join the pack on hunts for food.

"Is everyone in position?" Vora asked her little sister. Mara's tail twitched in excitement.

"Everyone's all set, big sis" Mala whispered excitedly.

"Good. Could you get Velt here for me before we fully begin?"

Mara gently nudged her big sister in her neck. "I'll go get him"

The younger female hurriedly stalked away to carry out her sister's orders. Vora panted in excitement.

Velt was Vora's mate. Like all other male Utahraptors, he had the characteristic crest of black head feathers that could flare upwards depending on how he's feeling. To Vora, Velt was everything she wanted in a mate: kind, soft-spoken, and devoted. Whenever Vora made a decision that could threaten the safety of the entire pack, Velt was always there to call her out on it. With a few loving nuzzles, she would rethink her decisions with Velt's input.

After a few more minutes of waiting, Velt joined his mate's side. Vora smiled upon seeing her desired male. Velt knelt by Vora's side and nuzzled her cheek. Vora returned the gesture of affection.

"Are you ready to do this?", she asked the male.

"I'll just try to keep you from making any reckless decisions" he replied.

"Our future offspring will be lucky to have such a smart and caring father"

Since they were both young adults, they haven't had a clutch of eggs yet. But the nesting season was right around the corner, which gave them both something to look forward to.

"Anyway, let us focus on the task at claw: figuring out which hadrosaur to focus our hunt on" Velt said.

And with that, the Utahraptors focused their full attention on looking for decent prey.

Most predators would target the old, young, injured, or sick individuals to catch. They're the easiest to catch. Vora and Velt stealthily stalked through the grass to look for any potential weakness in the herd. They were treading so carefully that the hadrosaurs were blissfully unaware of the pack's presence.

More minutes of searching later, Vora and Velt found the perfect target: an old bull hadrosaur. The old bull had a large gash going down it's right leg and was walking with a limp. He must have recently survived an encounter with a larger theropod. He wouldn't be able to run far or fast, and he'd be too weak to put up a big fight. He was absolutely perfect.

Vora gave a low-pitched cooing sound, signaling to the rest of the pack that they have found their chosen prey. Velt had the same eager expression on his face.

Her toe claws and fingers clenched and twitched in excitement. Her gaze was fixed on the helpless creature before her. She would prove that she was worthy of being alpha. She would provide for her pack.

Before the pack could do anything, though, something suddenly appeared in the sky and distracted both predators and prey.

There was a bright light in the sky that almost looked like a second sun. Only this orb of light was growing bigger and brighter. The hadrosaurs and Utahraptors were starting to get scared of this unnatural phenomenon before them.

Vora had to get her pack to safety. Screw the hunt! They would get another chance again. But right now, Vora had to get her pack to safety. She turned around to call out to her pack to run away.

Before she could call out to her pack, a sudden and strong feeling of drowsiness overcame her. Her body felt like it was immersed in warm water. Her head felt like it was filled with clouds. She felt herself becoming weaker and weaker with each passing second. She got so weak, her legs gave out from under her and sent her to the ground.

After a few more seconds, everything went black.

Vora opened up her eyes to blinding light. Not the unnatural light she remembered seeing before, this was thankfully normal sunlight. She could hear the buzzing of insects in her ears and could feel that see was lying on the top of a grassy hill.

Trying to regain her strength, she forced herself to stand up. As she looked around, she saw nothing familiar about her environment apart from the sun and bugs.

The trees didn't look like those in the forest her pack uses as a nest. She sniffed the air to try to recognize any scents in this area, but found none. She let out a call to try to find her packmates. There was no return call at all.

"Maybe if I look around, I could try to get my bearings" she said to herself.

Raising her head as high as she could, she looked around for anything that could potentially serve as some kind of marker for the rest of her pack to find. Soon enough, she found something that looked really bizarre.

There were really tall and flat-looking rocks in the distance. That was just weird enough that her pack might gravitate towards it to find each other. They could work out a game plan from there.

With a newfound sense of purpose in her heart, Vora set off towards the weird rocks. She would find her pack. She will find a way back home. It was her duty as the alpha.

Author's Note:

I hope you all enjoy this first chapter. It was quite a lot of work.

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