Dinosaur Armageddon Vol. 1: Vengeful Promise

Chapter 10

Vincent quickly turned his head around, looking towards the direction of Walter's gaze. What he saw was a very gruesome scene.

A large dinosaur carcass.

Vinny felt bile rise up his throat, but he managed to keep it in. This wasn't the first time he saw a dinosaur carcass, but not one like this.

The animal was about twenty-eight feet long, and judging by its size, it was probably two tons when it was alive. Now, however, the carcass was bloated and it had a foul stench. Vinny could hear the buzzing of flies.

What the hell? he thought.

Naturally, curiosity got the better of him and he inched closer to the remains. Vinny could hear Walt follow him, obviously wondering what exactly was the dead animal in front of them.

They walked around the animal's head. Vinny noticed a long snout with ridges along the sides, as well as a pair of tiny horns located above the front of the eyes. Half of the skull was charred and black, the other half, to Vinny's disgust, was maimed horribly. There was no skin, hardly any flesh, only the bones of the head were left, pale white with faint red spots that seemed to have been where there was once blood.

Vinny also noticed that half of the animal's body was black, while the rest of it appeared to be a shade of bronze yellow. He also realized that the carcass was partially eaten. The whole side of the creature had been ripped and torn, exposing deep red ribs that stretched into the air. Vinny could see some of the muscles and even a few massive organs that were damaged or untouched.

A cloud of flies buzzed above the corpse. As they lifted off, Vinny could see a few burned feathers on the creature's back and neck. He also noticed numerous bite marks on much of the corpse. Some of them were small, but there were also huge puncture marks, obviously left by some sort of large carnivore.

"What do you think it is?" Walt asked.

Vinny squatted down, not taking his eyes off of the animal. "It's hard to say, but I might be able to identify it." His brain began to work, the cogs meshing together. He pushed his big-lensed glasses up the bridge of his nose. He took in the carcass in full detail, his eyes darting left and right, up and down.

"It was obviously a medium-sized theropod, over eight meters or so," he observed. "Weighing probably two tons. Short neck, a typical trait. Reduced forelimbs.Three fingers on each hand capped with claws, the middle claw being the biggest. Long snout, prominent ridges and small horns above and in front of the eyes covered in keratin." Vinny then stood up straight once more and shifted his gaze to meet Walt's. "I'd say that this is the remains of an Allosaurus fragilis, a medium-sized carnivore from the Late Jurassic Period."

Walt looked at the carcass for a brief moment, taking in all the details, hen nodded. "It makes sense. There can truly be no doubt. But what really bothers me is the fact that half of the body is burned. How did that happen?"

Vinny returned his gaze back to the dead Allosaurus. From where he stood, he could see some of the red muscles along the neck and back that had yet to be eaten. Walt was right about the burns. The whole front of the body was charred and black, as if a fire was thrown at it.

This makes no sense, he thought. There are no signs of a forest fire anywhere around here. All the trees and undergrowth are perfectly intact. So how did this thing die?

To many scientists of the age, paleontology was like a murder mystery. A body is found, they identify it, and then they try to find out how it died. The trouble was, though, fossils never told the story of the animal's life or death, so it was up to the scientists to try to figure it out by looking at clues on the remains and by researching the environmental as it was at the time of the animal's age. There were many factors that could have led to the inevitable death of the dinosaur, such as injury, sickness, starvation, even getting caught in a flood that drowned the animal. But even then it was all speculation. There just wasn't a smoking gun. There was no sign somewhere saying "This is how I died".