Time: Late Cretaceous, Maastrichtian, 66 MYA

Location: Montana

Mission Log: Day 4

Days Until Meteor Impact: 1

The powerful yet calming sounds of a waterfall echo through the forest. The rushing waters of the river below drown them out the further down you go. The calls of prehistoric life fill the air. All these things are what Fluttershy hears as she makes her way downriver. After returning to the late Cretaceous, she set off immediately to find a T. rex. Fluttershy has at least less of a day left to accomplish her mission. The meteor is closing in, and once it hits, the dinosaurs will be wiped from the face of the Earth. The only survivors will be the birds.

It's not just the dinosaurs that will be wiped out by the meteor strike.

Fluttershy grabs her binoculars and looks up when she hears a call from the sky above her. She witnesses a flock of pterosaurs flying overhead, and can't help but feel sympathy for the doomed creatures.

Fluttershy knows that everything she sees around her will be devastated.

As the pterosaurs fly away, Fluttershy takes in her surroundings. This lush forest, rushing river, and clear skies will soon be gone.

“What a majestic place. Pterosaurs swooping overhead, you can hear them calling all of the time," she says before taking a quick sip of water from the river. "And sweet water. But it's hard to believe this stream will be choked with ash and dust. The meteor is going to hit not too far away, and time is running out. This is my second rescue mission, and I'm determined to rescue some T. rex for Prehistoric Park."

Fluttershy continues her way down the river, and after a little while, she can no longer hear the waterfall. As she makes her way along the river bank, she checks the ground, looking for something. There's a reason why Fluttershy decided to follow this river. It's connected to the lake where she witnessed the failed T. rex hunts and saved Theo and Edmonton. When she arrived at the lake earlier today, Fluttershy noticed some blood on the rocks at the mouth of the river, along with something else.

There are lots of dinosaur tracks to follow, but Fluttershy’s interested in one set in particular.

Before long, Fluttershy finds what she's looking for. She crouches down to get a better look at a set of T. rex tracks. However, these aren't the tracks of any random tyrannosaur.

"There's something strange with these tracks," Fluttershy states. "Look, this one here, the toes have been dragged along. And I think it's the adult T. rex that was gored in the stampede."

The previous day, during the hunt, an adult Tyrannosaurus rex appeared and attempted to take advantage of the failed hunt enacted by the young trio Fluttershy had followed for the last couple of days. The adult had managed to get ahold of a young Triceratops, only for an adult to come in and attack the rex. The fight resulted in the Tyrannosaur becoming injured and the herds escaping. The predator then attempted to hunt Theo and Edmonton. Fluttershy attempted to rescue the two young herbivores and use them as bait to lure the tyrannosaur through the Time Portal. However, while the Triceratops and Edmontosaurus went through, the rex didn't follow.

"We're pretty close to where the stampede was. You can see where it dragged its toes through the mud. It's injured, and if it's got an injury it'll be moving pretty slowly. And if we head downstream and follow these tracks, we may be able to catch up."

Fluttershy makes her way downriver, following the tracks. As she does, the river's edge becomes rockier and rockier, confusing Fluttershy. Why would a T. rex, an injured one, travel down this part of the river? Despite that, Fluttershy knows that she cannot stop and ponder.

The track takes her downriver, where she's hoping to gain ground on the T. rex. With any luck, its’ injury will make it slower and a little easier to catch.

Fluttershy marches on, and after an hour, something catches her attention. She’s walking along the river's edge when she hears branches and leaves being moved and crushed on the ground above her. That can only mean one thing: the T. rex is here.

"Listen," Fluttershy says quietly. "Its footfalls are reverberating; it's up there somewhere. And an animal that weighs nine or ten tons, they can walk quietly but can make noise when they choose to."

"And look," Fluttershy points to a dead Triceratops in the river. "There's a Triceratops corpse, and it can smell that. That's why it's been moving so steadfastly along the river."

However, just above Fluttershy, the T. rex was moving toward where she was. The predator was huffing hard, clearly in pain. Its steps crunching the leaves and branches before touching the dirt. Fluttershy hears it and quickly takes cover at the river's edge, hoping she won't be found.

"Get on your back." She orders. "We don't want it to see us."

The predator's head looks over the edge, hissing in pain. Fluttershy keeps as low as she can; luckily, the T. rex has its eyes on something else. It sees the dead Triceratops flowing slowly down the river. It recognizes this corpse as the same young Triceratops it almost killed the previous day. Despite being saved by the adult Triceratops, the injuries the young one received were too great, and they ultimately succumbed to them. It had died in the river as it attempted to cross.

The T. rex moves on, following the carcass. The Tyrannosaurus' injuries make hunting difficult, so it has to resort to scavenging. The dead Triceratops would make for an excellent meal.

"It's starting to move away," Fluttershy says, rising from her hiding spot. "I'm certain it was the one attacked by the Triceratops."

The T. rex has been able to track down this free meal despite being badly injured because T. rexes have a superb sense of smell.

The T. rex moves downstream, following the corpse. After a few minutes, the injured predator stops. The dead Triceratops is now stuck between some rocks.

It's in luck. The Triceratops carcass has become stuck. This is Fluttershy’s chance to get really close to it.

Fluttershy does get close, and she examines the injured animal. The T. rex's left leg shakes as it stops at the river. Fluttershy also takes notice of the crests on its head.

"The crests on this one's head are not as pronounced as those of the three young T. rexes from before, and it's lighter in color. This one is much bigger than them, thus older, so I believe it's a female," Fluttershy states.

As Fluttershy watches, the T. rex carefully attempts to reach over and grab the carcass. The rocks are loose and slippery, so she must be careful if she is to get an easy meal.

"And she must be so hungry; she's desperate for an easy meal. Even though T. rex is everyone's ultimate prehistoric monster, you just can't help but feel sorry for her," Fluttershy says. The female T. rex growls in frustration and pain. Her leg hurts, and the easiest meal she could get is just out of reach, across a flowing river with loose terrain. "She's a top predator, and they're so top-heavy; if she went in this fast-flowing water, she'd be flipped over easily. But she's desperate to get at the meat." The poor animal takes another shaky step forward, her mouth drooling out of hunger. "I just feel so sorry for her. She's desperate to get out there. It's just across the water, but she's got no chance."

The T-rex isn’t the only predator drawn by the temptation of a free meal.

On the ridge over her head, a series of squawking and chittering could be heard. Fluttershy looked to where the sounds were, and there stood at least four or five smaller theropod dinosaurs overlooking the river from their vantage point. Compared to the gigantic T-rex, these minuscule predators were less than a third the size and much more lightly built, with much smaller heads. Black and white feathers adorned their bodies, giving them a more birdlike appearance. Each of the creatures' hands were tipped with three fingers ending with long claws and rusty red wings and tail fan. And on their long, powerful hind legs, the middle toes bristled with the trademark talons of their species.

Fluttershy’s eyes widened in dread. "Dromaeosaurs! More commonly known as raptors." Luckily for her, the raptors took no notice of her presence, their eyes solely focused on the Triceratops carcass.

Futtershy took a closer look at their features. "These must be Acheroraptors. They must've been attracted to the Triceratops carcass too."

Soon, the pack rapidly closed the distance, darting past the T-rex who snapped her jaws at their approach, snarling her irritation. Unlike their tyrannosaur rival, the agile and nimble raptors had no problems in leaping over the river and navigating the rocks to reach the ceratopsian’s carcass. In almost no time at all, the entire band was perched on the corpse, gobbling down chunks of flesh with their serrated teeth and squabbling for the choicest cuts. The T-rex could only look on helplessly, her jaws salivating.

Taking notice of the gigantic intruder in their midst, the Acheroraptors hissed and shrieked their displeasure, feathers raised in aggression.

"She’s backing down. It doesn't look like the raptors are in any mood to share," noted Fluttershy sadly.

The female T. rex makes one last attempt to grab the carcass. She takes one more step closer, but her injured leg causes her to hiss in pain once again. Once again, she stops, but this time she gives up. It's too risky for her to get ahold of the carcass. Grumbling in defeat, the tyrannosaur leaves, leaving the raptors to feast at their leisure.

The T. rex limps off, leaving Fluttershy to figure out what to do next.

It has been a few hours since Fluttershy found the injured female T. rex. After considering her options, Fluttershy decided to head back to camp to regroup with her team and devise an effective strategy. The injured female is not too far from camp, and based on where she headed after giving up on the Triceratops carcass, she's likely to head in Fluttershy’s direction since it's where her best chances at hunting are. Fluttershy thinks that if she makes it to the camp, she and her team could lure her through the Time Portal. How, though, is still a question.

Upon returning to camp, Fluttershy is met with a strange sight.

When Fluttershy reaches the camp, she notices that her team is all standing at the edge of the creek below, watching something. Curious as to what they're seeing, Fluttershy heads down to join them.

"Hey everyone," Fluttershy greets her team, who all greet her back. "What's going on?"

"Over there," one of the team members points out.

Fluttershy grabs her binoculars and looks in the direction everyone else is. What she sees fills her with joy because off in the distance is a herd of seven dinosaurs. Most were grayish-brown, although a couple were green. They were bipedal, with no feathers, spikes along their heads' backs, and stripe-like patterns along their bodies. Most importantly, the tops of their skulls were dome-shaped. Fluttershy knows exactly what these are.

"This is so exciting. It's a herd of Pachycephalosaurus," Fluttershy says, ecstatic at what the team had found. "They belong to a family of dinosaurs, the pachycephalosaurs, whose main feature was the large dome on the top of their skulls. Paleontologists originally theorized that they were used for head-butting. However, over the years, some speculated that their skulls were too weak for it and instead were used for display because tiny fibers were found in the skulls. Those fibers likely displayed bright, vibrant colors. However, recent discoveries have shown that pachycephalosaurs did, in fact, head-butt, and they could withstand a force similar to what American Football players withstand, which is a tremendous amount of power."

This herd of Pachycephalosaurus is not head-butting. Instead, they are feeding on the vegetation around them. The ones with lighter green coloration were the females, while the two darker ones were males. What catches Fluttershy’s interest are the males.

"Look, the big one with the yellow neck and bright red dome head has got to be the dominant male. The other male has some of those colors, but they're not as pronounced as the leader's, and he's smaller. I guess that he's not reached maturity yet."

These Pachycephalosaurs will become extinct as well. But Fluttershy has other plans.

Wasting no time, Fluttershy rushes back to camp and grabs the Time Portal.

"I would love to have these Pachycephalosaurus back at Prehistoric Park," Fluttershy says as she heads toward the herd with her team. "I think that if we corral them, we might be able to get them to go through the Time Portal. But we must be careful because all of them, especially the males, could charge, and if they hit you, it could cause a lot of damage to your body."

Now, closer to the herd, Fluttershy sets up the Time Portal. With it set up, Fluttershy and her team now come up with a strategy to get the Pachycephalosaurus through.

"What we're going to do is we're going to take our vests off and surround the herd. We will expect the dominant male to become defensive, but if we manage to cause the rest to panic and run towards the Time Portal, he might follow them," Fluttershy says quietly as she and the team get into position. They must be quiet, or the whole herd will become alarmed, and the trap might not work. They all quietly surround the dinosaurs and get their vests ready. On the count of three, Fluttershy signals to enact the plan.

The team jumps out, waving their vests at the herd. The pachycephalosaurs, alarmed, move close together for safety. The dominant male circles his herd, keeping himself between the "attackers" and his herd. He bellows out an aggressive call at Fluttershy and her team. In the dinosaurs' minds, they don't know what they're dealing with. They're used to their typical predators, but they've never seen anything as strange as the creatures surrounding them. While stressed by all this, the dominant male keeps as calm as he can. However, the rest of his herd are beginning to panic.

Seeing her moment, Fluttershy activates the Time Portal. With the Portal open, the team advances toward the herd. Sensing the panic in his herd, the dominant male makes a charge at one of these strange creatures. He causes some team members to briefly back up, but they regroup and continue pushing on. The dominant male Pachycephalosaurus had no intentions of attacking but had hoped that he could have scared this new threat away. He snorts loudly and scrapes the ground, preparing to charge again, but before he can, his herd runs toward the Portal, too panicked to stand their ground. The male whips his head back and sees his herd run through this strange-looking mist. He turns back to his adversaries, and in his mind, he has to decide: stay and fight or follow after his herd. Luckily for Fluttershy and her team, the male picks the latter. The Pachycephalosaurus whips around and rushes through the Time Portal after his herd.

With another successful rescue, Fluttershy closes the Time Portal before she and her team head back to camp to devise a plan to rescue a T. rex.

Time: Present Day

Location: Prehistoric Park

Mission Log: Day 4

Days Until Meteor Impact: 1

Back at Prehistoric Park, Rarity receives word on seven new arrivals from the Late Cretaceous.

Rarity, who had been busy somewhere else earlier, drives over to the holding facility. Running through her mind is the thought that Fluttershy had brought back seven T. rexes. Once she arrives, she walks over to the holding pen where the Park's new arrivals are contained. Luckily for Rarity, her worries disappear... mostly.

"Ah, I know you lot are going to be a handful," Rarity states.

Author's Note

Yeah, I decided to hold off on Theo's teenage phase because I wanted him to grow a little more. Don't worry; I'll be doing it somewhere down the road.

To make up for it, I added a herd of seven Pachycephalosaurus, and yes, I did base them off the ones from Prehistoric Planet. I can't wait to write future scenes with them. I've already got a few in mind.

Also, I replaced the pack of Dakotaraptor with the smaller Acheroraptor because some people believe that Dakotaraptor was not a valid genus of Dromaeosaurid, but instead a chimeric species.

What do you guys think: Was Dakotaraptor steini a real genus or just a chimeric species? Tell me in the comments below.