The Flash: Eyon Of The Speed Force

Chapter 5 - Inside The Speed Force Part II

Axxel rolled and crawled through the log with haste; he barely managed to exit the other side of the hollow log before the T-Rex's massive jaw bit a chunk out of the thick wooden coverings. There was a crunch that sent a chill down Axxel's spine.

'That could have been me.'

Still, he was a man on a mission, and right now, Axxel's mission was rather plane...

"TO SURVIVE!"

Axxel's bellow was provocative, and it seemed his provocation had served its purpose when the Mechanized Monstrosity roared back in defiance. After all, while angering the beast was ill-advised, an angry enemy was much preferred to a calm enemy.

'Unless the enemy is a Super Saiyan.'

Axxel swerved between trees, trudged through mud pits, leaped over the deep crevices, and swam across three rivers to get away from the Mechanized Monstrosity, but nothing he did could evade the T-Rex stalking him.

At some point, Axxel was sure it had become but a game for the creature.

Twenty of his steps were worth one of the T-Rex's. Physically speaking, there was no way he could escape. Maneuverability was no issue for a mechanical creature filled with futuristic technology the like Axxel could no phantom.

And things were getting worse by the second.

By now, the poop that had been disguising Axxel's scent had been all but washed away, so the T-Rex – master tracker on a bad day – had to spare little effort to track a Speedless-Speedster with a thick scent of fluffy apples.

Axxel had noticed it for a while, but it became more apparent by the second – he smelled of apples and a different kind of apple at that. He ran and ran, taking note of the steep dropping rapidly approaching from ahead.

A series of rocky cliffs were a couple of hundred meters ahead, but that would hinder Axxel as much as it would hinder his chaser. At this point, it was bound to become a battle of wills. Judging by the fact that the T-Rex could chew through granite, Axxel didn't have to think very hard to realize he would soon be at a disadvantage.

'Unless...'

Unless – like the creative Marine he is – Axxel decided to take a shortcut.

Axxel mentally prayed to all the Gods he knew – which was not a lot – and dashed towards the cliff's edge, directly leaping into the open air instead of carefully climbing down. Someone else would think twice before jumping, but even when he was powerless, Axxel had been leaping off cliffs, so there was no need to stop now.

It was a little above a hundred-foot drop. As his body cut through the air, diving into the inevitable collision with the ground, Axxel was hoping beyond all hope that his new physique could manage such a fall.

Axxel's stomach churned and twisted, but he kept steady in the air while falling, trying to stick the cool hero landing that would bolster his confidence. There was something profoundly uplifting about sticking a hero-landing.

Yet, what he got for all his efforts was anything but heroic.

Around twenty feet from the ground, Axxel lost his balance as he encountered a thick branch, and what followed was a belly flop unlike any other in history. Of course, the first collision was followed by three more branches, hitting Axxel in the back, face, and butt.

Finally, he face-planted onto the muddy ground beneath the cliff.

Axxel suffocated for a couple of seconds before rolling over, concentrating his swollen eyes on the edge of the cliff where he could barely make out the Mechanized Monstrosity circling near the edges.