If there was one thing that Sobek didn't lack, it was inventiveness. One of the few things he had inherited from the human part of him was the art in which human beings best excelled above all other creatures: malice.

Humans knew how to exploit the feelings of the masses in their favor, especially the powerful. The people were an important weapon, perhaps the most important, and with the right words it was easy to incite. Or with the right actions.

Sobek knew that in an open fight he and his army would lose miserably. They were by no means ready to face a coalition made up of all human armies. If they just revealed themselves, it would all be over in no time. But if the people had sided with them... then things changed.

Sobek was aiming for this. He had devised a cunning trap not to get a victory, but to force ordinary people to take sides with him, even if unwittingly. Unbeknownst to them, they would have kept the politicians from making their moves… and that would have earned Sobek all the time he needed.

Obviously, this plan involved many steps. However, this was a double-edged sword. A very complex plan was more difficult to complete, but at the same time made it more difficult for enemies to discover the true purposes behind his actions.

That night, the first stage of the plan began.

"Did you memorize the instructions well?" he asked as soon as the moon was high in the sky.

The dinosaurs roared in agreement. "Very good. Let's attack! I want prisoners, remember!". He let out a deep growl and his eyes sparkled, appearing like embers in the dark of night. "And I want them all!"

********

Finney lazily lit a cigarette, admiring the lights twinkling throughout the building.

Even at night, the oil wells and coal mines worked at full capacity. Obviously they were illuminated thanks to electricity. Seen from above, the colony of Odaria appeared at night like many bright dots on a completely dark land.

Obviously, not all of the territory was illuminated: most of the initial pits and mines were already exhausted. Only those on the edge of the forest were still in business. There was a reason why humans planned the expansion: the natural resources in the colony were now at their limit.

Finney was one of those people who worked nights. He was the lighting man for coal mine No. 136, one of the few still in operation. All he had to do was stay close to the generator and make sure it was always running. If the lights went out for even a moment, it would be a huge risk to the workers in the mine.

Finney yawned. Like almost every person who lived in Odaria, he worked more than twelve hours a day, excluding overtime. Such a schedule would have been considered inhumane in more civilized parts of the world, but in this dictatorial country few cared about workers' rights. As a result, Frederick slept little and badly. He had been tempted several times to take a nap, but he dared not do it: if an accident had happened with the generator, it would only be his fault. If he didn't want to be responsible for the deaths of several people, he had to stay awake.

He suddenly noticed a flicker behind him. It seemed to him that a shadow had passed by. He looked around but saw nothing; eventually he blamed his exhaustion and went back to smoking his cigarette.

Big mistake.

Within seconds he felt a clawed paw grab him by the shoulders and knock him to the ground. Fortunately, the impact wasn't powerful enough to break his back, but it still hurt him a lot. When he opened his eyes, the blood in his veins froze as an elongated, vaguely reptilian snout covered in feathers was in front of his face.

He tried to scream, but the creature put a paw over his mouth and nearly choked him. Then he turned him around and kept him pinned to the ground. Finney clearly felt the unmistakable shape of a claw brush his back.

Something stopped his hands and legs. Within seconds he found himself tied like a salami. Then something was put in his mouth to keep him from making any sound. From the taste, it looked like a plant. Maybe a vine?

"This is taken. Here we go!"

Whose voice was that? The timbre was too deep and guttural to belong to a normal person. It sounded more like a growl, like the cry of a beast.

Clawed paws grabbed him and dragged him away. The whole time Finney was face down, so he couldn't see where they were going, but from the brightness of the ground he suspected they were leading him to the mine entrance.

Finally they stopped dragging him, but at that point they forced him to get down on his knees. Finney was able to look around him again and felt fear, terror, panic and multiple other sensations he had experienced throughout his life, all at once. He was kneeling in front of the mine entrance and with him, tied and gagged with vines, were all his colleagues who, like him, worked outside the mine: communications workers, guards, truck drivers, etc. And to keep them prisoner were a group of various creatures with a mixed appearance between reptiles and birds.

Dinosaurs.

Dozens and dozens of dinosaurs, all with their foreheads tattooed with a star and their cheeks with lines. They towered over them, watching over them like jailers.

"Did you get them all?" a voice came from their shoulders. Finney barely turned to see a huge carnotaur come forward. He sharpened his eyes to look for some human behind him, or perhaps directly on the animal's back, but he saw no one...

And then something inexplicable happened. A utahraptor stepped forward and opened his mouth, but what came out of his mouth was not a verse, but words: "They are all here. We checked: no one is missing"

Finney's brain disconnected for a moment. Had a dinosaur just spoken!? It was not possible, it was inconceivable...

"Very well". This time it was the carnotaur who spoke, and Finney recognized the voice that he had spoken at first. "Listen to me, humans! If you take us to the miners currently working in the mine, we will save your life. Do you agree?"

Finney looked at his colleagues in shock, hoping someone knew what to do, but they were just as scared as he was. No one what was going on. It was all so absurd!

Nobody dared oppose. All the captured humans were made to stand up and the dinosaurs were led inside the mine. Alone the dinosaurs would have taken hours to explore all the tunnels, but thanks to their 'kind' guide they found all the miners in a few tens of minutes.

Hundreds and hundreds of workers were captured, tied up and led out. All of them were terrified and no one even thought for a moment of rebelling. Whenever a dinosaur, even a small one, passed by, they shivered like withered leaves.

The carnotaur approached the utahraptor who had spoken earlier: "Go and inform the pack leader that we're done here"

The dinosaur nodded and within seconds disappeared into the dark of night. Finney hearing those words could only think: "My God... there are others..."

Unbeknownst to him, that story was repeated in every mine, in every oil well, in every quarry, in every street that was outside the main city of the colony, Cartago. These places weren't protected by walls and had very few weapons; there was no way that humans could defend themselves, and what's more, the dinosaurs had carried out a surprise attack.

Towards dawn, every human being outside the safe city walls was captured, bound and gagged. But that was just the beginning. As soon as the sun began to brighten the sky with its rays, the dinosaurs set out and led the prisoners to the city.

*********

The alarm was sounding throughout Cartago. People, most of them just awakened, were panicking.

Each city, mindful of the three hundred years war, had a general alarm device in addition to its walls. It was hardly ever used, but when it went into operation it meant only one thing: trouble.

Throughout the city, police cars sped through the streets asking the population not to leave their homes and to remain calm, but this only increased their apprehension. In addition, those who lived near the walls noticed several armed soldiers rushing towards the city gates.

Malcolm had rushed to Dreyfus's office as soon as he heard the alarm, but was told he had gone to the wall. So he had made his way towards the gates of the city; the policemen had tried to stop him, but when he had mentioned his identity they had decided to let him pass.

Malcolm quickly climbed the stairs, not having the patience to wait for the elevators to clear; on the bastion he found the mayor leaning over the parapet. "Dreyfus!" he screamed to drown out the sound of the alarm. Despite the deafening sound, the elderly man heard it and turned to him. "What is happening? The alarm is sounding throughout the city, and they told me at your office that the workers have stopped communicating..."

"You can see it for yourself" Dreyfus replied simply, pointing to the open space beyond the parapet. Malcolm walked over and leaned over to see, and his heart skipped a beat.

In the desert plain in front of the city gate, hundreds, no, thousands of dinosaurs of all kinds were motionless staring at the walls, an expression absolutly not reassuring painted on their faces.

=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=

AUTHOR'S THOUGHTS

Hi! Time for another of our little chat. There is a lot to talk, so make yourself comfortable and let's start immediately!

1) First, let's introduce quite a few dinosaurs. Monica, the brachiosaurus, takes its name from a character in the series 'Dinosaurs', a television sitcom that aired between 1991 and 1994 and featured a family of dinosaurs. Monica is the name of the only sauropod that appeared in the series (probably an apatosaurus) and is the neighbor of the protagonists' house, as well as best friend of Fran (the wife of the main character, Sinclair). In the series she often plays the role of a nonconformist, not lowering herself to the rules of society that see women only as housewives and instead wanting to work on their own ('Dinosaurs' is in fact a parody series of American society in the 90s). Since I enjoyed this series when I was a child and I've always liked this character, I decided to include him in the story as Monica the brachiosaurus.

2) Then we have Pierce. Fans of the 'Jurassic Park' franchise should have immediately guessed where it comes from: Pierce takes his name from a kentrosaurus that appeared in the 'Camp Cretaceous' series. Since it's a more well-known animal, I opted to swap the kentrosaurus for a stegosaurus.

3) Next we have Blue; in this case, even non-fans of the 'Jurassic Park' franchise should have recognized her, since she is an extremely famous character. She is the velociraptor that appears in 'Jurassic World', 'Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom' and 'Jurassic World: Dominion'. Like many other velociraptors that have appeared in the franchise, she has extraordinary intelligence, but also accompanied by a high level of empathy, which has made her one of the most beloved dinosaurs in the franchise (along with Rexy and the spinosaurus). I could therefore not include her in the story: here she is a common velociraptor (therefore with feathers and much smaller than her film version), but she maintains a high intelligence and great acumen that allow her to understand how to use objects. But now a question: Were velociraptors really that smart in reality? Well, no. Apologies to Jurassic Park fans, but velociraptors didn't have the wit to open doors. Their IQ, according to our knowledge today, was more or less close to that of an ostrich (as well as almost all dromeosaurids). Ironically, today we know that the tyrannosaurus was probably much more intelligent than the velociraptor (contrary to the film), reaching a not indifferent IQ (for some scientists even comparable to the one of a primate).

4) Echo and Delta are too two velociraptors that appear in 'Jurassic World'. In my story I have represented them as two pyroraptors to give more space to this dinosaur, as well as to make a small reference to 'Jurassic World: Dominion', where a pyroraptor appears. Pyroraptor is a dinosaur that lived about 70.6 million years ago in southern France and northern Spain. Its name means 'fire thief' since its remains were discovered following a fire in 1992. Because of its name it is often represented with a red color (although he has no evidence of this characteristic). Although it is not well known, in addition to 'Jurassic World: Dominion' it has also appeared in 'Prehistoric Planet' and 'Dinosaur Planet'.

5) Finally Eema is a character that appears in the Disney film 'Dinosaur' (yes, I know the names all sound the same. Don't blame me, it's the authors of these films who have no imagination). In the film she is a very old and wise female styracosaurus; in my story I wanted to represent her as a triceratops (since she is more known) and a little younger, even if still 'old' (at least from the point of view of the dinosaurs).

6) Now let's talk about the humans. All the character appears in chapter 156-160 come from the movie 'Dawn of the Planet of the Apes' of 2014. To speak for some of them, Malcolm is a scholar who aims to keep the peace between humans and apes, Dreyfus is the head of the human community (the human species in fact in the film has almost become extinct due to a virus) and Ellie and Alexander are respectively the partner and son of Malcolm. In my story their roles are similar to the original ones: Dreyfus is the mayor of the colonial city of Cartago, while Malcolm and the rest of the group are researchers tasked with finding oil resources.

7) The way Malcolm and his group meet Sobek and the dinosaurs (chapter 158) is very similar to the way they meet Caesar's (the leader of the apes) group in the movie 'Dawn of the Planet of the Apes'. Sobek's way of hunting them is also the same.

8) In chapter 159, the conversation between Dreyfus, Carver, Malcolm and the others is very similar to the one in 'Dawn of the Planet of the Apes', were they explain to Dreyfus that they met talking monkey.

9) The way Rambo tricks Alexander (chapter 159) is inspired by the way the chimpanzee Koba tricks two human guards in the movie 'Dawn of the Planet of the Apes.

10) The dinosaurs' discussion of whether or not attack humans (chapter 160) is inspired too by the discussion of the apes shown in the movie 'Dawn of the Planet of the Apes'.

11) The phrase 'As for right now, we are at war' is instead a reference from the film 'Avengers': it is what Nick Fury says after Loki's escape with the Tesseract at the beginning of the film.

12) The way Mitch discovers the contamination speed of the Mother Cell (chapter 154) is inspired by the way he discovers it in the series 'Zoo' (where the character is taken from).

13) The speech that Sobek makes inciting the dinosaurs in chapter 153 ('This is our land!') is partly inspired by the speech made by Jake Sully in the film 'Avatar', where the protagonist incites the Na'vi to fight against the human invaders who are destroying their world.

14) The images that Sobek shows the dinosaurs in chapter 152 are based on some scenes from the documentary 'Last day of the dinosaurs' (even Sobek himself admits it!)

15) The Linguistic Relativity Hypothesis (Chapter 150), also called the Sapir-Whorf Hypothesis or SWH, is a really existing hypothesis in the study of languages named after the Swedish linguist and anthropologist Edward Sapir and his student Benjamin Lee Whorf. It states that the cognitive development of each human being is influenced by the language they speak; in its most extreme form, this hypothesis assumes that the way one speaks determines the way one thinks. Obviously, this is a hypothesis that has not yet been confirmed and is subject to controversy, but which nonetheless has solid foundations. This hypothesis is also used in the film 'Arrival', where precisely the aliens allow humans to obtain more knowledge simply by teaching them their language. In my story I used this hypothesis to explain the rapid increase in cognitive abilities of dinosaurs (if I had stuck to their actual intelligence, most of them would have been very 'stupid' from a human point of view).