Age of Monsters by John Schneider (a book to read txt) 📕

They were footsteps.

They'd heard about the giants.  But they hadn't seen one alive yet – not in the sticks.  Just those carcasses along the trail.

But now, something was coming – something BIG – just over the other side of the hilltop.

The three robbers exchanged nervous looks.  Terry put his gun in Jonah's face.

“Enough,” he said, looking at Naomi.  “Tell your old lady to give up the gun, or I'll shoot you.”

Jonah and Naomi both blurted at once, “We're not together!”

Terry took note of the worried look on Jonah's face, but decided to play the card anyway.

He pulled the hammer back.  “I'm not kidding, lady.”

Naomi made no move.

Another tremor struck – heavier than before, accompanied by another echoing bellow that shook the remaining glass loose from the broken chopper.

From over the ridge, towering over the tallest trees, the first of the giants appeared, silhouetted against the stars.

Its shadow blotted out the rising moon.

A sauropod – they had not seen many plant eaters – this was the first they'd encountered alive.

It was a monolith, taking up the whole horizon, its giraffe-like neck reaching more than a thousand feet high.

Jonah craned his neck up, looking for the tell-tale glowing green eyes, but found them absent.

After a moment, he realized why.

The beast had no head.

The tip of the two-hundred meter neck was tattered – the comparatively tiny skull had been torn completely away.

Jonah had seen chickens running around after decapitation – he'd heard of a hen that had survived seventeen days without its head, expiring only when its windpipe healed over and it suffocated.

The monster on the hill was far and away from that – and in the meantime, a truly mindless, utterly unstoppable juggernaut.

“You know,” Jonah said tiredly, “I had supplies at the cabin that would have lasted us for months.”

Naomi glared.  “And if I'd come alone, I wouldn't have just crashed in a goddamn helicopter.”

The three robbers exchanged glances, with Terry actually sparing Jonah a sympathetic man-nod.

Naomi promptly took advantage of the distraction to step forward and jam two fingers into the eyes of the man holding her at gunpoint.  This was followed by a palm strike on the nose.

Everyone else blinked, startled, Jonah included.

For someone who didn't seem to see much of a hero in him, she sure seemed to expect it – apparently, just trusting him to up and take-out the other two armed men on his own.

Given no choice, Jonah did his level best.

As the two of them reflexively turned towards where Naomi was beating-up their friend, Jonah simply charged, shoving them both into each other, and then throwing a haymaker – maybe Terry would have a glass jaw.

Nope, he thought, as pain racked his knuckles – solid granite.  But the blow staggered him, so Jonah slugged him again, and he went down.

Naomi was wrestling her man for his rifle – he was blinded and bleeding, but he still had the presence of mind to cling to his gun.  He was also big, and starting to overpower her, so Naomi simply let go, stepping back and kicking him hard in the groin – a good, athletic soccer-style kick.

Caught completely off-guard, the man sucked a gasping breath, and dropped to one knee.  Naomi wrenched the rifle from his hands, and then turned it butt-first into his forehead.  The man dropped bonelessly to the ground.

Jonah tackled the second guy just as he was regaining his feet and bringing his own gun around again.  But Jonah caught the barrel, and then, taking Naomi's example, turned the stock hard into his opponent's chin – this time knocking his man down and out.

Reaching for the loose rifle, Jonah was actually thinking he'd done alright, when behind him, the side-panel door of the van slid open and a woman popped out, pumping a shotgun, and pressing both barrels against the back of his head.

Terry was just picking himself up, reaching for his own shotgun, when Naomi stepped forward, and pressed her purloined rifle against his head.

The two women regarded each other.

“Put your gun down or I'll shoot him,” Naomi said.

The hippie-chick in the van snorted derisive laughter.

“I don't give a shit, I can get another one of him.”  She poked the barrel into the back of Jonah's head.  “You like this guy?”

Naomi returned the favor, with a poke to Terry's head.

Jonah and Terry exchanged nervous glances.

“Listen, Ariel,” Terry began.

“You just shut your trap,” Ariel responded curtly.  “Gutless wonder.”

On the ridge, the headless sauropod had started moving down the slope.

Its trajectory seemed to more or less be in their general direction.

Jonah cleared his voice.  “Um.  Ladies, do we really want to do this right now?”

Naomi and Ariel eyed each other warily, but then Ariel pulled her gun back.

“Okay,” she said.  “Get in.”

Naomi likewise lowered her rifle.  Terry looked at her warily, and then turned, knuckles up, and started to swing on Jonah one more time.

Ariel interrupted with a wide-open palm-slap, smacking Terry dead in the face.  Terry staggered, grabbing his nose.  “OWWW!  Bitch!”

“Are you KIDDING?” Ariel shouted.  “Get in the van!”

The sauropod had now been joined on the hillside.

A massive rex with bloody jaws towered high above the hundred-foot evergreens.

Jonah guessed they could stop wondering what had happened to the sauropod's missing head.

It wasn't alone, either.  The rex was followed by nearly a dozen others, and together they began tearing massive chunks out of the shuffling, mindless beast – amputated of its ability to even react, as it was eaten alive on its feet.

The gang of them thundered down the hillside.

Like scampering mice, the tiny little humans piled into the van.

But as Jonah slid into the back, he was greeted by a parrot-like screech directly in his face.