Roarn Rex's Arc

Chapter 1 of 2

The nest was empty, and Roarn Rex had been staring at it for an hour. He was a kid in a red T-Rex costume with armor plates sewn into the chest, and he led the Dino Rangers, and none of that had stopped someone from walking into their valley and taking the egg. The egg was supposed to hatch into the guardian the Rangers needed. Without it, the valley stayed open. Roarn set his hand on the sword at his hip and made himself look at the shell dust one more time. The raider had left nothing. No prints in the soft dirt. No broken branches. The trail he needed did not exist, and every hour the egg went farther. Sky landed beside him in her pink pterodactyl suit, wings folding in. "I flew the whole ridge. Nothing." Her voice was flat. She did not sugar it. "We're losing it, Roarn." Brachio came up behind them in yellow, his head low in the base of the long neck. "River's clean too. Whoever took it didn't walk out." Roarn looked up. "Then they were carried." He cut west, past the nest, into the rocks the Rangers rarely patrolled. Sky flew overhead. Brachio swung his heavy tail through brush to clear a path. Roarn kept his eyes on the ground until the ground stopped him. The print was pressed into stone. A foot the size of a table, five deep toe marks, the heel cracked into the rock like something enormous had stood there and pushed off. Roarn knelt. The edges were fresh. "That's not an animal," Sky said. "It's a man," Brachio said. "A big one." Roarn had heard the name in warnings from grown-ups. A gray giant with a word tattooed across his chest. The henchman. The one who guarded the lab. A rustle came from the scrub. Roarn drew the sword. A low creature slid out on clawed forelimbs, snout down, sniffing the print. Scaled back, sharp ears, curious eyes. It looked up at Roarn and did not run. "It's tracking him too," Sky said. Roarn lowered the sword a little. The creature snuffled at the footprint, then at Roarn's boot, then turned and started padding west along a line only its nose could see. They followed. The snoutclaw led them to a ridge that dropped into a hollow Roarn had never seen before. Below, half-buried in the rock, sat a squat building with black vents. A gray giant stood at the door with arms crossed, the word DARKNESS across his chest. Beside him, in a black coat and heavy goggles, a thin man cradled something round and pale against his ribs. The egg. Dr. Darkness lifted his head as if he had heard the thought. He did not look surprised. "You're early," he said. "Brutus. Inside." The door slid shut behind them. Roarn had his trail. He also had a locked lab, and the egg was already through the door.