This is just a short little portion of the long chapter awaiting next. Sorry for the wait guys. I ran out of ideas mid-way through, and it was difficult to pick up afterwards. But the next chapter is actually going to be a huge moment for this story

Sort of like a Stranger Things moment for (characters with the first name 'B', if you know what I mean "wink, wink")

I must've been faking, I thought miserably, or unconscious at least.

Pain swarmed all around my body when the sense of touch returned to my scales, and then the return of all that agony. I almost shrieked when I woke up, but then again, what would screaming do?

I was still in trouble.

When my sight returned, part of one eye was in the shallow dark water, the other half in clear air, surrounded by darkness. I squinted at first, partially the fact that my vision was still a bit disoriented, but for the time being, I could at least see clearly. But as it cleared up to normal colors, I could catch the outline of a claw, or a three-toed foot, sharp and black-tipped, and wet from the ground.

"Shadow?" the voice muttered. And immediately I knew the belongings of that creature, the box of that voice.

"Whiteclaw!" I raised my head up from the side, wincing and groaning, until my neck was above the smooth ground.

And there stood the free-standing, not dead Deinonychus.

"How-" I froze, then continued, "How are you alive?" He looked at himself and frowned with joy.

"Don't know. My jaw is fixed," he moved them up and down, "And so are my injuries. And look! My eye is good too! But I saw you........die....... so I was about to ask the same thing." I looked down at my claws, and towards my hind where my pubis and tail curved and stood hanging at its edge.

I was spotless.

"This is creepy," I shuddered, "I'm really creeped out."

"Same," Whiteclaw sighed below me, then turned to me with a frown of confusion, "Wait, what do you mean how am I alive?" I opened my jaws once then sighed, knowing that these news could shake him.

"You....um.....how long have you been in here...from your perspective?"

"What do you mean? Why?" He cocked his head.

"Just.....just because." My eyes glowed as I saw him think.

"Sort of feels like about a day at least. Perhaps less. What about you-"

"You've been asleep back at this new cave for 8 days Whiteclaw," I clicked. Whiteclaw looked as if he got stabbed, and his face went into a new low, "What?"

"8 days Whiteclaw," I whispered, "I'm sorry..."

"8...." His mouth gaped a bit, along with his nostrils, "Then....how many days until-"

"Based on how long we're talking now....3 days at most." Whiteclaw's heart sank, and he bowed his head in fear and sorrow.

"Is......(sigh)....Amberclaw's dead isn't he?" he trembled.

I nodded.

He placed his claws on his head and dragged them down, and i could see the slight quake in their movements. He put one on the front of his snout and closed his eyes, bending his knees.

"I left him to die-" He began, but I shook my head.

"It's not your fault," I responded to his pain, "Don't put everything on your shoulders just because your related to them. It only makes things worse for your..."

"I did the same thing with Blackclaw and Brownclaw....Drexel too....and now its...." He curled his fist, turning up a growl in his throat. I had a sense of sympathy for him, but at the same time, wanted to pull away from his side. I couldn't image what if felt like to lose everybody you were born to protect and love, everyone important.

Whiteclaw was basically family-less now.

"Whiteclaw it's....its not your fault..." I began, but something stopped me.

Actually I stopped myself, since me and Whiteclaw felt the same thing.

The ground was shaking.

My heartbeat began to rise as I saw the water begin to move all over the place, and the earth rock back and forth, throwing me off balance since I was larger, yet Whiteclaw hung on with his claws.

"Whiteclaw..." I panicked, "What's happening?"

Seconds later, water droplets began to rise from the floor. Whiteclaw's eyes widened as they rose higher and higher, consuming us in total blackness, and in one blink, disintegrated into vapor.

No....it wasn't vapor....it was smoke.

Like tentacles, or smooth cylinder ones in fact, the smoke twisted and turned towards us, and immediately, I knew what presence that belonged to. It curled and swished around, sounding like a distant wind designed to kill, and formed in the distance a strange shape in the darkness.

And when the dust cleared, the shape of a white-skulled Triceratops gleamed in the distance.

Creepily.

No flesh, no organs, no meat, nothing. Like us, it was spotless, and bent its head in creaks, inaudible at first in my ears. But as it moved towards us, a faint gleam of red burned bright in its eye sockets, and a small curled impossibly on the bone.

"So how was the experience?" He boomed, his voice echoing all around. I gaped my mouth a bit, yet Whiteclaw snarled fiercely in front of me, curling his lips to shine his teeth bright. Neither one of us said nothing, and when the Shadow realized that no words were to be spoken, he cocked his head and grinned.

"No One?"

Silence.

"Good I guess, eh?"

"I'm going to rip this demon apart," Whiteclaw hissed, though I didn't know specifically who he whispered his comment towards.

"You could heroic all you want Whiteclaw," the shadow called in the distance, thinking that his recent sentence was upon him, "I know your wrongdoings carnivores. I know your fears!"

"But like I said before, you don't know me."

I glanced at Whiteclaw, still a bit uncertain about his protective and threatening pose. His skin rippled and his pupils shrunk back, and instantly I knew he was already prepared to hunt this thing down, no matter how long it took, or how much blood is lost. His claws themselves trembled and twitched, like his thigh muscles.

The only thing twitched for me was my tail.

He had the hint of rage in his eyes, and his toe-claws thrashed in constant taps on the water.

Strangely enough, the shadow didn't mind his attitude or dangerous pose.

He wasn't even afraid of a fight.

"I killed you both once," he proclaimed darkly, shifted his herbivorous bones into creaks and awful groans, "and I could do it again just as easily as before."

"What happens if we die twice?" I questioned worrisome.

All that came back was a stomach turning grin from the skull that made my heart jump in fear.

The malevolent ghost's skeleton of the Triceratops slammed its foot into the ground, and I guessed that Whiteclaw felt the vibrations that rumbled through my feet from his threat. Triceratops did that when they were about to fight for mates or courtships.

This was nothing of the kind.

A tingle of fear flooded my chest, and I took one slight step backwards.

Even Whiteclaw sensed it, and to prevent himself from emitting his own fears, he motioned to me.

"Shadow, remember when I taught you those moves weeks ago?" Whiteclaw clicked, bobbing his snout. I nodded, lowering my skull to his side to listen in.

"Yeah?"

"Time to put them to good use," He sneered, bounding his shoulders and lowering his body, low enough where his dangling claws could pierce the water below, while his tail went high.

The skeleton roared loudly, glaring at us with empty eye sockets, then snorted, puffing up smoke from its two open nostrils.

And then it charged...