The Way of the Cowboy

The Way of the Cowboy

Chapter 3

Way up high, in a rugged old tree, sat a nest, built out of a mixture of sticks and grass. Within the cozy home sat a sleeping blue bird atop three small sky blue eggs. She sat contently, thankful that she picked such a well hidden location, away from the prying eyes of predators from both the ground and sky to hatch her offspring. Though the small bird sensed a change, the tree's leaves rustled back and forth a great deal more than they did normally. Peering outside her nest, the little blue bird takes notice that she's not surrounded by a thick forest anymore. Perplexed, she darts and flies further out onto one of the outer limbs of her tree to get a better understanding of the unusual situation she had found herself in.

The look of confusion adorned the bird's face once she reached the outer portion of her tree. The blue bird realized that her tree was floating, high above the forest, in a pink colored sky. A sudden loud yell brought the hen out of its stupor, darting its eyes to where the noise originated from. At the mouth of a canyon that opens up to a swamp, she saw a strange looking creature on two legs. The creature, for the most part, was the same color as her feathers she noticed. It started to quickly move to a large green thing that was just as odd as the creature.

Just when she was about to let her curiosity get the better of her, an even louder monstrous roar, shook her floating home. Knowing what terrifying monster that roar belongs to, she frantically flies back to her nest to protect her eggs as best she can. She hears a strange low rumbling noise get loud then start to get quiet as it leaves, but she also hears the large foot stomps of the monster treading through the boggy water and reaching dry land. She hears another roar and the quieting foot stomps of the gigantic beast as it gets further and further away. The little blue bird huddles her eggs and sits safely in her nest, while silently wishing the best of luck to the strange creature.

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POV of Ty Thompson

“HOLY SHIT, HOLY SHIT, HOLY SHIT, WHAT THE ABSOLUTE FUCK IS THAT DAMN THING!!!” I yelled out in the cab. I had the 4650’s throttle wide open and in the highest gear that she could go. I headed up the canyon, mainly because it was the only way I could go with the tractor. I thanked my lucky stars that the bottom of the canyon was relatively smooth, I was cruising along at 25 miles an hour according to the gauge. But every once and a while there would be a washout that I would need to maneuver around. The obstacles were a pain in the ass, especially with a damn four headed monster chasing after me…”HYDRA! That's a goddamn HYDRA!!!” I yelled as it finally clicked inside my head.

I glanced in my rear view mirror, and saw the monster. Four heads, four big long necks that connected to a large single body, and complete with a long whipping tail, That confirmed my assumptions. Though the monster was a ways back, every obstacle I come to, the hydra gained some ground on us. “What the fuck are we going to do?!” I chanced a glance at my rifle, “I doubt a .30-30 would do shit in this situation except just to piss it off, even more.” I spoke to myself. “I just pray to sweet baby Jesus that this canyon leads to somewhere, and not just a dead end!”

Coming up to a bit more difficult washout, I slow down so I can cross it without ripping the front axle off, one of my rear tires falls into the trench then starts to spin. “SHIT NO NO NO!!!” I shout. Looking back the Hyda is roughly 300 yards away, but closing that distance at a rapid pace. I hurry and shift to neutral, and stomp the DIFF LOCK in to engage both rear wheels in sync. I set the loader bucket down with the blade getting a good grip to use as an anchor, I use the hydraulics and rock myself forward while also putting it into gear. The outcome was a success, but now the hydra was less than 150 yards away, I could feel the tremors from the monster's foot stomps, which motivated me to immediately put it into high gear again.

After what feels like 5 miles since the bog, I came to a sharp left curve in the canyon, and once I made the turn I stumbled upon quite the site to see, that left me in both a state of awe, and shock. I was left awed due to the site of a very large dilapidated stone castle outside and overlooking most of the canyon. I was then left in a shocked state and almost feeling the blood start to drain from my face. We faced what looked like a dead end to the canyon. To the left of the castle was a wide and winding stairway carved into the canyon's side. “Shit I wonder if I can climb out of here on those with the tractor!” I said to my dogs.

I drove over and started to climb the steps, but I started to spin out due to steep irregular shaped steps. Back where I started at the bottom of the stairway, with the hydra just now making the corner, I frantically tried thinking about what I should do. There's no time to ditch the tractor and climb out of here on foot, by the time Shay and Lyra got out of the cab that monster would have pretty easy targets. I glanced back up the canyon and noticed a cave that I didn't see earlier, it looked big enough to fit the 4650 into, but small enough to escape a hungry hydra! “FUCKING CREEPPY CAVE IT IS THEN!!!” I yelled, and aimed the John Deere to the entrance of the cave with a rather large reptile hot on our heels.

Reaching the cave entrance I chanced a glance back and saw four large mouths, all with extremely sharp looking teeth on an outstretched necks reaching town to go for a bite. Heads 1 and 2 snapped their jaws shut, just narrowly missing the cab of the tractor. The other two were a different story, head number 3 must've accidentally bitten head number 4, who was wailing up a storm trying to get free. With the hydra still charging as fast as it could move, 1 and 2 tried to go for another bite, but ultimately slammed their heads into the cliffside. We made it safely into the cave just in the nick of time.

“Holy shit we actually made it girls, WE MADE IT!” I spoke to my companions. Shay and Lyra poked her heads up and peered out the back window, not quite 100% ready to believe me. Once they saw that the giant hyda can't reach us, they calmed down a bit. I checked the tractor quickly, she was running just fine, nothing was broken, and the fuel gauge still read FULL. Putting the 4650 in gear I slowly drove deeper into the cave.

I Almost had to turn the headlights on, but the cave started to get brighter and brighter the further we ventured into the cave. It looked like there were very large deposits of amethyst on the ceiling and walls of the cave, it looked as if the stones were glowing. Coming into a rather spacious chamber, I take notice of yet another strange sight. What stood in the center of the underground room was a very large tree. I parked the tractor next to the strange tree and killed the engine. I got out of the cab and let the dogs out too, though they kept close to my side. Walking up next to the tree, I take note of something odd. Trees usually have bark, but this one did not. Reaching a hand out, I placed my hand upon the trunk of the tree, it was cool to the touch and very smooth, a lot like how petrified wood feels like. Withdrawing my hand, I start to look up at the massive tree, stopping when noticing a couple odd symbols on the trunk. The first was a crescent moon with a small star, above that was a sun. Taking a few steps back I looked further up the tree to see a large six pointed star in the center. The tree looked devoid of life, it looked lonely all by itself in this cave. Was this some kind of shrine? I reached up and was able to run my fingers over the lower moon symbol. It wasn't carved in, it was as if it grew like that. “Very strange.” I muttered quietly.

An extremely rank odor flooded the air and my nose. I knew what that was, I scowled at both of my dogs who came from behind the tree. I go look and sure enough, two big piles of excrement sat not two feet away from the trunk of the petrified wood tree. “Well at least you two didnt do that inside the cab when we were getting chased…Hell I'm lucky I didn't let a brown trout out by accident myself!” Looking back towards the mouth of the cave I can see that the hydra must have given up, it was waddling its way back down the canyon. Pink colored rain clouds were following it overhead, and head number 3 had its mouth wide open and pointed to the sky to catch the rain. I shake my head, still not sure what the hell is going on or where the hell we are.

Then entirely without warning the sky turned to blue, the trees in the air vanished, the clouds were white. Behind me a faint white glow caught my attention, I turned to face the tree and to my surprise, it had a slight glow to it. It started to get brighter and brighter. “ God damn it dogs! You done pissed off a dag gum petrified wood tree by shitting on its roots!” I shouted out. The tree continued to get brighter and brighter to a point where I had to shield my eyes with my hat and hands, I felt my dogs lean up against my legs. Within the crazy few seconds, I felt my whole body go numb and tingle, as if everything went to sleep, feeling like pins and needles. Then as soon as it started, it stopped, I uncovered my eyes, to see the glowing tree losing its luminescence, and returning to its former state in which I found it. “WHAT THE HELL IS GOING ON HERE!!!” I shouted to whoever could hear me.