Dinosaurs! (Forger of Worlds Book 3)

  Dinosaurs!

  Forger of Worlds Book 3

  Simon Archer

  Contents

  1. System: Kepler 47

  2. Zaxcs

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  9. Gobta

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  15. Erlking

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  29. Titania

  Chapter 30

  31. Jodie

  Chapter 32

  33. Mab

  Chapter 34

  Chapter 35

  36. Gobta

  Chapter 37

  Chapter 38

  39. Queenie

  Chapter 40

  41. Titania

  Chapter 42

  Chapter 43

  44. Erlking

  A Note from the Author

  1

  System: Kepler 47

  Something strange was happening in a system that was, to the outside observer, pretty normal. In fact, this pretty normal system contained just three pretty normal planets that orbited two pretty normal stars in an otherwise pretty normal binary star system.

  Sure, these particular planets rotated at about the same speed, so their days and nights were about the same, and the system’s two suns, a yellow dwarf star and red dwarf star, only took about seven and a half days to complete a full orbit of each other, which was a bit fast, but not uncommon enough to be of note.

  No, what made this system unusual was that these seemingly insignificant planets had intelligent life. And not just any intelligent life...

  A nine-foot-tall green reptilian creature with blue skin and green spots, that, if one squinted quite right, sort of looked like an upright, featherless velociraptor stepped out of a massive, translucent curved bunker. He wore an oversized, dark overcoat over his standard military dress uniform and was currently peering into the sky above the planet he occupied, which, among the three planets, was known as Kepler-47B.

  He gestured behind him with one clawed hand, and another tall reptilian, this one wearing a blue overcoat, ran up and handed him a pair of what looked like fancy binoculars. Taking the handles of the oval-shaped device with both hands, he peered up into the sky once more. There was a buzz and whirr from the device as he thumbed its controls before the image cleared enough to watch the two stars his planet orbited. Or what remained of his system’s stars, anyway. Because, for all intents and purposes, while some light did shine through the open vents in the structure that had been built around said stars, most of what he saw was metal. And ships.

  Several ships that were massive enough to be just seen magnified in the distance but tiny next to their cosmic counterparts orbited around both stars.

  “Fuck,” he muttered quietly under his breath. Then he handed the binoculars to the blue-coated reptilian, turned around, and headed back into the bunker.

  The bunker was bustling with activity, a hub of Reptilians in military uniforms, suits, skirts, ties, medical scrubs, and everything in between were walking around with purpose, and a bit more haste than usual. Some were speaking in groups, others into devices. Computers were scattered all around the room, which was set up in a cubicle-like fashion. A quick glance down revealed the many levels of the structure that had been burrowed out of the hard blue rock that made up the planet, all filled with reptilians doing various, very important things.

  As the tall Reptilian in the large overcoat walked back through the bunker, several people stopped to salute him while still making sure to get out of his way. He moved briskly until he reached the elevator and hit the down button. He waited. The activity continued on around him as he patiently waited.

  The elevator dinged, and the Reptilian entered. Two others entered as he pressed the button for the bottom floor. A shorter Reptilian wearing a skirt and glasses entered after them and faced forward. She moved to hit a button on the elevator, found it had already been depressed, and instead dropped her hands and clasped them in front of her. Then the four rode down in silence.

  The elevator stopped at the bottom floor, and all exited. They walked through another flurry of activity and phones and noise. The little entourage entered a small room off to the side, where another elevator awaited. That one, they rode that down several more floors before exiting. A large security contingent awaited them outside of a checkpoint before another elevator. The Reptilian nodded at the guards who got out of his way, and the four continued to the next elevator where they again went down.

  The Reptilian in the overcoat entered a small room with fifteen other, highly decorated Reptilians who sat at a large table that occupied the majority of the room. A huge monitor stood on one wall.

  “Have we got everything set?” he asked the room.

  “Relatively, General,” came the response from a female Reptilian with glasses and a lab coat.

  There was an uncomfortable silence at the table that made him think otherwise.

  “Do we know if that thing is going to work?” the General inquired when no one else voiced an opinion.

  Another uncomfortable silence fell across the table.

  “General…” the female Reptilian wearing the lab coat stood up. “It will work. At least, the shield has been working in all our simulations. By turning our two stars into Dyson spheres, we have been able to make a sort of flytrap that we think will mitigate his speed.”

  The General nodded at her, and she sat back down at the table.

  “And we don’t know where he is?” the General asked again.

  The female Reptilian who had ridden in the elevator with the General spoke up. “No, not exactly. None of our patrols have come back, so we’re flying a little blind, given his speed.” She put her head down for a second, and the table was once again consumed by silence. She gathered her thoughts before continuing, “But we know he’s close. All it took was a little quick math, even if we can’t get eyes on him. We’ve been tracking him for a while, but he dropped off within the last few days. We thought he might be getting farther away, and we might be getting lucky, but we think he’s tricking us somehow.”

  “And how’s that?” the General responded.

  She shoved several documents and papers onto the table. “Well, when we receive a radio signal, it will be at approximately the speed of light. And these ones?” She pointed to a chart on a piece of paper. “He used to be moving pretty near to that speed, but lately… lately, he’s been slowing down. In fact, there was a time several days ago where he had ceased moving entirely. Unfortunately, he’s begun moving again at near the speed of light. So, with these readings, we can measure his velocity and his distance and calculate when he might arrive here.”

  “Can you spare me the velocity, V, in relation to the trajectory, T, in which gravity, G, of course, remains a constant spiel?” the General said.

  “Right.” She took a deep breath and let it out slowly. “Our original calculations had him breaching our solar system in about a day,” the scientist said sheepishly. “But since he slowed down, we may have a bit more time than we expected. Maybe an extra day or two.”

  “Well, that was somewhat helpful.” The General sighed and sat down at the seat at the head of the t
able. Then he put his head into his hands. “Okay, and what happens once he’s stunned by the trap?”

  A male Reptilian wearing a military uniform that was covered in a truly astonishing number of medals stood up. “Once the shield slows this thing down, we’re going to concentrate the energy from each planet’s core into a sort of laser beam type blast, focused on the, uhm, intruder. Our ships will have backed away into a sort of perimeter around the thing, and they will concentrate their fire on it as well after the initial stun and the beam attack.”

  The General sighed again.

  “Two Dyson spheres, decades to prepare, three planet’s firepower, thousands of ships, and millions of souls.” He looked at the room. “Do we even have a chance?”

  “General, you know the numbers as well as anyone else, but if you like, we can go over them again,” the Reptilian in the skirt said.

  “No.” He shook his head. “I don’t think that will help. At this point, we’ll either win…” He took a deep breath. “Or we won’t.”

  2

  Zaxcs

  Ever since my loyal minion, Erlking, had headed off to see his sister, Titania, I couldn’t help but think that he was going to fail me. Worse, I was worried that anything other than a straight-up confrontation with Garrett Andrews would not work, but Erlking was confident. He was loyal, and he had not failed me before. Still, it was frustrating that the galactic rules of engagement kept me from snapping Andrews like the twig he was. If I could just confront the man now, well...

  I sighed and shook my head. Perhaps Erlking would be successful when he headed to confront Garrett Andrews, something I could, unfortunately, not do yet since his system was so very far away. I’d reach it in due time, of course, and then, well, I’d have my just desserts.

  Still, now was not the time for that. Now was the time for death, destruction, and devouring. I turned my attention toward the small trio of planets orbiting two rather insignificant stars and saw a surprising obstacle. The occupants of the system in front of me had turned their stars and planets into what looked like some sort of weapon.

  It almost made me laugh. I had met with countless systems that had focused all their ingenuity on a weapon, but never had any gone to this level of commitment. Even from here, I could tell that literally every piece of metal had been mined from the system and turned into a massive armada of ships, satellite-based guns, and a whole host of other things meant to hurt, maim, and kill.

  I suppose it had all been done to stop me, which they would be unable to do even with forces as grand as this. Still, I appreciated the effort. It always made it more fun when they fought.

  As I got closer to the system, a sudden--

  WHAP!

  ZING!

  I was disoriented, and worse, I suddenly had a splitting headache. Loud ringing noises and flashing lights surrounded me.

  I probably should have been worried.

  But I was Death, Darkness, and Destruction.

  I was a god among gods.

  I held up my hand, and everything slowed down. Then I readjusted to my surroundings.

  What had happened was now obvious. I had slammed violently into a sort of force field created by these people, and while I had been stunned, if ever so briefly, they had blasted me. A lot.

  And zaps continued slamming into me from each of the three planets in the system. Huge, planet-sized beams of energy that must have drawn on the planets’ cores came flying at me. That was unpleasant.

  That was, of course, in addition to the thousands of ships headed my way, all with energy weapons erupting from them.

  Just for fun, I reached out and let one of the energy blasts strike my pinkie.

  “That hurts,” I said a bit surprised. “A little anyway.”

  I looked at the mass of ships that had once approached me, though now that I’d slowed down time, they were moving at a crawl. With a flick of my wrist, I sent them tumbling violently back into the void of space.

  Then I realized that it might allow some of them to live. And that was not acceptable.

  Where was the black hole in this galaxy? Hmm. I looked at the map in my head and found what I was looking for a little over that way.

  I pulled the tumbling ships back. They’d bitten off more than they could chew by opposing me, and now, I would show them just how weak and pitiful they were. I cupped and pulled my hand back over my right shoulder, careful to keep the mass of ships I was holding in line, and then flung them violently towards the inescapable pull of the nearest black hole while making sure to follow through on my throw so as to maximize the speed and terror of their deaths.

  I then turned my attention toward a Dyson sphere and kicked it far off into the void of space. Admittedly, it was strangely satisfying to feel my toe smash through the painstakingly crafted machine and breach the star itself. Sure, it wasn’t a kill per se, but I was reasonably sure that with the star’s containment unit breached, the occupants wouldn’t survive long.

  I turned my attention to the other one and grinned as it seemed to hang there lifeless now that the first sphere was gone. It wasn’t a threat at the moment.

  But what was?

  I glanced at the three planets, and then, in a burst of genius, I knew exactly what to do. I reached over and grabbed onto the Dyson sphere while being careful to keep from puncturing the metal shell surrounding the star too much. Then I flung it at the closest planet.

  The planet crackled and erupted into an explosion of sparks and gases and flashes of light an instant before the Dyson sphere exploded. Both disappeared entirely from existence an instant later.

  Well, that was that. I turned my attention to the second planet and, with my godly senses, saw one of the tiny inhabitants on it, making a very rude gesture at me. So, I did what anyone would do in my situation. I punched him in the face. Of course, my fist was a bit more powerful than most people’s, so really, what happened next should have been expected.

  After reducing the impetuous creature into paste, my fist smashed into the planet’s surface with enough force to crack the thing in two. And because the planet was, ultimately, a barely held together equilibrium of natural forces, the resulting explosion shattered said planet into countless fragments of rock that went flying off into space.

  I turned my attention to the last planet remaining in the small solar system. It was the largest and had the most life.

  I had been traveling through space for a little while, and I was hungry.

  I looked at the planet and opened my mouth wide.

  3

  “So, this is why you really wanted to stay ‘til morning, Master.” Queenie, the Ant Queen I’d killed and resurrected from the void to serve me for all eternity, smiled at me as I dug into the delicious stack of pancakes that Elephelie had prepared. “You know, there are probably some places where these are very rare. They might be able to make us a nice trade for something.”

  “You really think so?” I asked around a mouthful of pancake. “I hadn’t considered that.”

  “I think so, master.” Queenie nodded fervently. “They are very delicious, and as someone who enjoys the sweets of the Bazaar very much, I believe these would do well there because I have never had anything like them.”

  “Hmm…” I puzzled over the idea. “Maybe we should talk to Jane about it.” Jane was the slime girl who ran the Adventurers’ Guild and was, for all intents and purposes, our liaison to the trading world we called the Bazaar. “What do you think, Elephelie?”

  “I think that would be a great idea, Garrett.” The Amorphie Princess of Day smiled at me. “And I know you’re not just suggesting it because you have a stake in all our dealings with the Bazaar.” She winked at me. “You’re one of the good ones.”

  “I hadn’t even considered that, actually,” I responded as I finished another pancake. “But these things are good, and if Queenie says they have nothing like them, you might be able to build a nice little business until we figure out how to mine the riches beneath
your ocean.”

  I sighed. Even after removing the dungeon core from the planet, the waters were still teeming with monsters, and it would likely take a few generations before that situation resolved itself.

  “If you think it is a good idea, I will contact Jane later today.” Zemia looked up at me and smirked. “After all, if we have a way to bring in additional revenue, we should take it.”

  “I agree,” I said as I decided one more pancake would definitely fit in my stomach. “Say, Jodie, any updates on the mining problem?”

  “Ugh, no.” Jodie had a massive stack of pancakes piled high in front of her and wore dark glasses over her eyes. She was also slumped against the wall with her face in her hands.

  “How we doing, Jodie?” I asked the very hungover redheaded catgirl scientist/rockstar.

  “Preparing to solve all of our mining problems,” she half-heartedly whispered back at me. Then she audibly groaned.

  “Right.” I laughed. “So, we get back to the Halls of Research, figure out a way to mine that deep-as-hell treasure trove, and then continue to build up our army to stop the world-devouring, grade-A asshole, Zaxcs?”

  “It sounds like a perfect plan, master,” Queenie said as she put her hand on my shoulder. She had a way of making me feel accepted and comfortable, certainly in a way that I had never imagined when we’d first met in the Training Dungeon, and she’d tried to drive a dagger through my chest.