The Monster Under My Bed

Please Don't Run

Ripper tapped his sickle claw impatiently against the floor. He wasn't sure what was going to happen, being a dinosaur and all, but he could sense in his gut that something big was coming. The Indoraptor thought he heard voices and crouched low. Soft little footsteps ran in his direction. It was Maisie. Excited, Ripper perked up, inching closer to the bars. She looked worried. Ripper was concerned the other humans would harm her.

He carefully reached out with a careful claw and touched her ponytail. Maisie gasped, whirling around. Ripper whimpered, pawing at the bars, trying to act like a dog to appease her. Scared, Maisie yelped and ran away. Ripper roared in fury, then angrily turned away to embrace the darkness of his cage for a moment.

Why didn't she remember him? All those times they played and cuddled together, did they mean nothing?! Ripper softly cried, wagging his tail slowly across the floor.

Then they came. Those other humans, with their sharp tongues and painful tasers. Ripper heard gears turning, and the next thing he knew it all turned white.

Cameras flashed, some idiot was yelling in a language he didn't comprehend, and the tasers hurt him so much that pain was all he knew. It infuriated him, but he couldn't get away or fight back.

"This is the most dangerous creature that ever walked the earth!" Idiot said. Ripper bellowed, and the crowd cheered.

More gibberish. At one point, Ripper saw a laser being pointed at one of the audience members, followed by a sharp high-pitched noise. In agony, the Indoraptor went for the man, but smacked head-on into the cage. Idiot laughed like it was all amusing to him.

Suddenly, a headbutter dinosaur came out of nowhere and trashed the place. Some weird-smelling man kept the cage in place after knocking down several guards. Ripper met his eyes for a moment, seething. The dinosaur could smell an odd, familiar scent...like that of a female raptor. Interesting.

Everyone who hadn't been hurt ran outside screaming for help. The weird man ran elsewhere. Ripper growled impatiently. He wanted to get out of here, for Pete's sake.

That's when the Hunter appeared.