Kill Your Babies: Should I Cut this Prologue Out?

Here’s a little scene-setting prologue I’ve been waffling on. Obviously it needs some work ( Ugh. Passive tense. It’s.) but I think it’s just going out the window. It doesn’t do anything in the book at all. If it gets cut, that’s the three out of the first five chapters I’ve cut as throat clearing.

The Bull Torosaur trotted along the creek bank and up over the edge to the plains. The wind stung his eyes. He lifted its snout to sniff the cool fall air. Winter was coming: the scent of dry grass and sage was carried on the breeze, along with something… else. It had been a cool summer, and it seemed to the old bull that things were slowly changing. The rest of his herd snorted and stamped behind him. A few of the cows had trotted past him: They knew where he was headed. He snorted and broke into a short gallop. It was important to be in front, to keep an eye out for the predators. It has been alive for most of a century and it had led the herd for most of the last two decades. Over the last few years though, challenges to his leadership had become scarce. There were only a few bulls left in the herd who were big enough and smart enough to challenge him, and most had already been defeated. He snorted. In a few years, as he weakened in old age, maybe. Maybe he would lose, and be able to go lie down in the green grass for one last time.

The herd came to a cut in the prairie and began moving parallel to it along a straight line. The Bull pushed to the edge of the herd and stopped. This was once not here. This was new. This was one of the things that was changing. The bull sniffed the air again. No scent of predators, but this was dangerous. He crossed over the cut and bellowed. The herd swerved, the older cows already following him, the rest taking a few tentative steps but wanting to continue in the direction they were going. The great machine slowly changing gears.

He crested a small hillock and stopped. Still no scent of danger, but this was the most dangerous time. His herd, his family, was crossing over the cut. Several of the younger Torosauri were balking and had to be goaded over the unnatural boundary by the older members. Some of the calves had broken out in a run and were playing, chasing each other, their mothers bellowing disapproval. He scanned the horizon, looking for trouble. There.

Off in the distance a black plume of smoke rose. The old bull knew this predator. It wasn’t like the old ones. It didn’t cull the old and the lame, it didn’t grab a calf and leave. This one was new, and it left death in its wake.

He bellowed in panic and turned, building momentum off the top of the hill and breaking into a gallop. The nearest cows and bulls sensed the panic in turn. They began to scream and call, urging the rest of the herd across the cuts before the monster was upon them. A low, rolling thunder began to build as the herd stampeded.

From the monster came a high pitched, shrill cry of triumph and it was upon them. It’s powerful body catching those animals closes to the cut in the earth and hurling them sideways, their backs and necks broken. It was a serpent, larger than any the old bull had ever seen. It moved unnaturally fast, scales undulating underneath its body with a rhythmic chugging. Steam and smoke pored from its head.

But the worst was yet to come. The Old bull knew from experience that the monster was infested with stinging insects. He had the scars along his back to prove it. As the head of the beast past him, he could hear the noise of the insects. There was a sharp crack, then another. The cow to his left fell, her neck geysering blood. The air was swarming with the insects now- sharp cracks from the back of the serpent and the buzzing of the insects as they past overhead.

The bull had been lucky so far. He had lived through this many times before, had protected his herd first as the ground changed beneath them and the monster’s course was laid in by its herd- the small, upright parasites that gathered along its route. He had protected his herd as the monster came, kept it away from the tracks it made as they made their yearly migration.

He couldn’t take it anymore. He had watched as his herd had shrunk. As other bulls and their clans had disappeared over the years. Once, his kind, and the others, the Ceratotops, the Triceratops, the great Brachiosaurs, had blanketed the plains. But each year there were less, and now he was one of the last. He roared and changed direction, closing the gap between him and the monster. He could smell the oily slick scent it gave off- something cold and mineral like. Not like an animal at all. He lowered his head and leaned into the monster, then punched, his shoulder slamming into the hard sides of its body. This was what he wanted. This was the challenge he was waiting for. Not some young bull after the cows, but this monster. To knock it off it’s rails, to leave it screaming and writing in the dirt, bloody and broken. The monster rocked, but didn’t leave its trail. He slammed into it again, and again, falling farther behind along its body.

Eventually, the serpent past him, the bright red of its tail fading off into the distance. The bull stumbled along the track, then sank to his knees. He could feel the blood along his shoulder, but there was no pain. He senses the herd crowding around him, but he was ready to sleep now. He had challenged the monster and lost.

The age of the dinosaurs was ending

 

In the club car, The Journalist from Chicago had put down his binoculars and had taken up his coffee cup again.

“Do they often attack the train like that?” he asked his companion.

The old soldier lowered the dime novel just enough for the journalist to see his eyes. He glanced out the window, then back over at the little man who insisted on interrupting him every few miles.

“Nope. They Didn’t before. But then, I reckon they didn’t have to when there was more of them.”

He went back to reading. The journalist glanced back out the window.

“Magnificent beasts. Just Magnificent. When get to Kansas City, I’ll make sure I get a pair boots made from some skin. Just gotta have some to be a real westerner, you know.”