FINTAIL

𝐓𝐖𝐎

THE OCEANS disappeared three months ago. It is a graveyard now.

As are the rivers, the creeks, and the seldom ponds that once gave it purpose.

Only a hush remains. It drifts quietly over each brazen skull gaping beneath the frozen mud. Voiceless, were they. Soulless. Alone. They stared into an abyss no living mortal can detail, jutting out their jagged jaws to the stars that deemed them unworthy. Beyond their mortal shells was everything and nothing; whatever insignificances existed on the coast had turned to stick and root.

Futile, my dear Nature. She waited for the rain to fall. But it never came. And it never would.

This aging Ghanaian night did not differ from the millions that came before it. Burning cycads rustled. Heatwaves wavered like the ghosts of the sea. And the archaic terrain shook to the touch of a spring breeze sweeping beneath the coils of a thousand clouds. Like a scavenger to the flesh, it clawed those who slipped into an eternal slumber. Those moping over dead promises. Those souls in whom I beckoned away.

It was here, just north of the bog, where I found 'Fintail'. You may think it is a name. It is not. Our hero bears a name, but has yet to speak it. What I know is this:

'He is the first. He is the last.

He is Fintail. And he is alone.'

Trudging helplessly across the mud-cracks, the ragged longsnout could only blow heavy sighs as his body burned beneath an invisible inferno. His thick tail remained low, dragging across the earth as would his fingers, claws, and snout; two eyes opening and closing as weariness drew near. Every minute an earthquake would rally; the theropod froze to attend the dying roars of his homeland, and allow its anger rock his body to the core. The ground would buck and shiver against him, each convulsive wave throwing rock and bone in all directions. A minute would pass before the world settled. And once it had, Fintail trudged onward, as if nothing ever happened.

I could smell the desperation in his lungs. Taste the spicy heat bubbling against the flesh where scale and fin met. Feel the torturous sting of each prudent step, the tightening of his calves, every sharp inhale and passive exhale filling his fragile lungs of smoke and ash.

He was dying. He couldn't sense it, yet. Or, rather, he didn't want to.

Another quake struck. The longsnout jolted forward and caught himself mid-fall, both fin and tail arching high enough to slice through thin air. The tremors dispersed into oblivion, just as before, but Fintail didn't stand up this time. Not that he didn't want to, he just couldn't.

Try as he might, even a careful observer could see that his body was beginning to fail. The bouncing earth had no actual tie to his relentless muscle spasms; this was fatigue — the telltale sign that a body can go no further. I was certain he had sensed it here — he no longer had the will to take another step. He shivered. He wheezed. And then, without warning, the longsnout broke into a violent coughing fit, spraying fresh blood across the rotten earth for the skies to watch.

That's when fear took hold.

It was this same fear that managed him a few more meters into the charred thickets ahead. The effects didn't change; he panted harder, breathed louder, his staggers more prudent and indirect. The heat was taking a deathly toll on our dear friend. His mind might've spat in the face of submission, but a body knows when it is time to stop.

As for Fintail, the alarm came suddenly.

Losing balance, he quickly reached for a dead sapling in hopes to reset himself. But dead weight was loyal only to gravity, and the poor predator was too slow to see his fate seal once the sapling snapped in two. His body plummeted, torso striking rock, tail flailing from behind as skin met earth, and out expelled one heart-wrenching cry to announce his doom.