Oh god. That is absolutely disgusting, I thought as I yanked the bloody spear out of the back of Ike's skull.

Teeth, brain bits, and other bits of mystery items hung from the stone tip like it was a sick halloween decoration. His head, or at least what was left of it, had a massive hole where his mouth, nose and eyes should have been.

They must have all moved to the spear.

The three gang members were more pieces than people at that point. Ursula was severed in a way that her top half fell the opposite direction of the bottom half. Her lifeless eyes were looking through her muscular legs. Hayle was not as lucky. She got the higher, more raised end of the string and when it passed through, well, she became a geometry problem. One piece was three quarters of a jaw, half a torso and an untouched bottom torso. The other was a quarter of a jaw with one and half eye balls and no ears. Where the rest of the pieces went was no concern of mine, but I did make one bloody mess.

My hands ached from holding the spear with a tight grasp. Holding onto the spider silk gave me the worst rope burn I'd ever seen on anyone, except for the remaining pieces of the women that were dispersed around me. The cut was deep on my right hand, deep enough to give the bone a break from skin and a breath of fresh air. The left was cut all the way around.

What the hell kind of spider makes web this strong?

The pterodactyl that was caught by the team of geometric shapes freed itself from the net and began to fly around me, squealing while it pecked at my arm with a large beak.

"Hey! Oh! I saved you! Get out of here!" I shouted as I flailed the spear around, wincing with every swing.

Suddenly, I had a barber shop quartet of annoying squawking birds. The gang's mounts that were still tied down were wrestling around, trying to free themselves from their chains. I picked up Hayle's head and was prepared to throw it at them when an elderly voice filled my ears.

"If the whole forest isn't already heading here for the nice meal you've prepared for them, then the squawking will definitely bring more, probably a Rex," it said.

I swung around to see Sam stepping out of a bush, his eyes giving me mixed signals and his mouth spread wide with a smile. He looked disappointed and proud at the same time. I didn't know whether I should feel accomplished or ashamed. I'd protected us from discovery, but created a gory massacre.

I realized I was still holding a severed head that was dripping blood and dropped it with an awkward smile, "First time you've caught a guy with a head in his hand?" I laughed, just as awkward.

"Surprisingly, a lot. I had a son remember," he laughed back.

Sam walked over to the three corpses and whistled.

"You killed three sparrows single handedly and um... creatively I guess," he praised.

"You're not horrified?" I asked, astonished.

Sam looked at me with both of his bushy grey eyebrows pushed up against his eye-lids.

"What did you think was going to happen when you hit them with a rope that was strong enough to hold you in mid air?"

"Honestly, I thought it was just going to knock them over. Or make them do that back flip thing that happens when someone gets clotheslined."

Sam's smile grew larger and he laughed so loud that it echoed through the woods. He gave me a pat on the back, then held out his hand for the spear. I handed it to him cautiously and when he took it, I could feel the skin on my hand leaving with the spear.

"You've probably guessed by now that this is no ordinary spider silk."

"You don't say," I muttered sarcastically.

Sam gave me a stern look, then tore off a chunk of a massive leaf that had fallen off of a tree and wrapped it around my wound. He tied the ends with some twine and looked at the animals.

"The man with leaf for shoes killed three sparrows. It sounds like a fairy tail. Now you have leafs for gloves, might as well call you Leaf," he smiled and laughed.

I smiled back. It was too stupid to be my real name, the name that I had forgotten, but it felt good to be known by something other than fresh meat.

"It's not the most intimidating name in the world, but it's something memorable. Hopefully I don't forget this one."

"Anyways, the spider silk comes from a species of abnormally large spiders called Arachnids. Their webs are nearly indestructible and stronger than any known metal. I once saw a guy being chased by a T-Rex run into a nest of Arachnids. The rex was their thanksgiving," Sam explained.

"If it's so strong, then why doesn't everyone have some?" I asked, somewhat afraid of running into another death trap after escaping a different death trap.

Sam shrugged his shoulders, "You have to steal it out of the spiders while they are still living. They don't leave their nests very often and when they do, they travel in packs. A nest has about a thousand to ten thousand spiders each, along with other creepy crawlers. Not everyone is willing to risk their timer doubling over a strong string."

A small tree in the distance swayed gently side to side. The tall shrubbery near the tree ruffled as if a non-existent wind had pushed it. Sam noticed my discomfort and looked at the dozen bushes and shrubbery that moved closer and closer to us. I heard a faint noise over the annoying squawking birds, a low pitched screech that sounded like turtles mating. Then, the same noise echoed three, maybe four, times across the moving bushes.

"I'm guessing those are not friendly?" I asked Sam, hoping I was wrong.

Sam shook his head and I saw fear in the old man's eyes. He spun around and flung the spear as far and as high as he could at the overly large sentinels. Without a word, he ran around the base of the tree like a madman going around in one full rotation.

"The animals are waking up for breakfast. I suggest you start climbing before you're brunch," he said with crazy eyes.

I latched onto the the string he'd wrapped around the trunk and together we worked our way up to the base of the spear. A branch large enough to hold two full grown adults was within arms reach and served as our support and our hiding spot. The mounts below stirred restless as the deadly screech grew closer and closer.

"We have to let them go," I said.

"No we don't. Our lives are more important than a few birds," he objected with terror in his voice.

A beast broke through the bushes as quick as lightning and as quiet as a mouse. If we weren't in the tree, the beast would have popped out behind us.

The beast had a slim body and hunched forward on it's hind legs. It's head was slim and long like the end of a hockey stick. Big, bright yellow eyes sat on either side of it's head and scanned for the source of the smell.

"That's a... a..."

"A raptor. Yes ,good eye, Captain Obvious. Now shut up before she see's us," Sam interrupted.

She moved closer to the bodies and began to sniff what was left of Hayle's head. With one heart stopping crunch, the raptor ripped the head to shreds and began to call.

"Oh god. I'm having Jurassic Park flashbacks," I whispered.

Sam kicked my shin and put his finger on his mouth. The bushes, in a circle around the corpses,began to ruffle. Three more raptors casually walked out of them and began to rip at the decaying flesh of my fallen foes. In a matter of seconds, the bodies were a pile of bones.

With their mouths bloody, covered in dead skin, and their hunger yet to be satisfied, they set their eyes on the tied down birds. I'm sure the big one looked like an all you can eat buffet to them. The birds had stopped their cawing when the raptors showed up.

Do they know what is about to happen to them? I thought to myself as I watched the pack slowly approach the mounts.

I could see the knot of rope that held them there. It was tied around the base of a tree and could easily be cut if the big one tried to fly away, but they didn't move a muscle.

"Sam, I can see the rope from here. We can climb over there using the branches..."

"Sh. A quetzal and some pterodactyl aren't worth putting more time on the clock. Let them be eaten so the raptors will leave us be," he interrupted again.

With every inch that the pack gained on the chained up mounts, my heart beat rapidly and gave me a twist in my stomach. I needed to do something, but Sam was right, the raptors wouldn't leave if they discovered we were in the tree, especially if we scared away dessert.

Just let them die. They mean nothing to you. They're just birds. Birds that belonged to the people you just slaughtered, I thought to myself as I ran my fingers along the branch nervously.

One of the pterodactyls lost it's cool composure when a raptors snapped near it's wing. It tried to take flight fruitlessly until the rope tightened around it's neck and it was forced to land. The whole pack was snapping at the birds playfully, as if they were playing with their food. The one that showed up first stood back and watched as the other three intimidated the birds. She was eye balling the string that confined the birds to the ground.

I leaned back against the tree and banged my head accidentally on the butt of the spear. That's when the idea came to me. I ripped the spear out of the bark and aimed for the string. I swung and let loose, but Sam grabbed the hilt of the spear and pulled it and me back towards him.

He grabbed onto my mouth so that I wouldn't make any remarks or attempt any more stupid ideas. He pulled me away from where I could see the massacre. The sound of raptor roars and shrieks of pain and fear told me everything I needed to know.

"I'm sorry. I couldn't let you do it. I told you, I can't die again. I don't have another ten years in solitude," he said after the raptor pack had left and we'd climbed down the tree.

The ground was dyed red and stunk of death. Body parts, human and animal, licked clean to the bone littered the area like a failing graveyard. The big turkey looking one, with the black feathered body and large wings, still had a lot of meat on it's middle body and other places where the raptors were not able to jump up to. Sam jabbed a small stone dirk into the bird's back and ripped out a chunk of meat.

"We gotta eat too," he said calmly, looking at me with peaceful eyes.

I didn't say a word to him the entire trip back to the tree house; not after he cooked the meat over a fire and not after I watched the burning, bright yellow sun drop behind the tree tops and fade away into a speckled black sky.

I sprawled across the floor looking at the stars when Sam came out to join me.

I tilted my head back and breathed the only words I'd spoken in hours, "You know, for a place so dangerous, it sure is beautiful."

"Beautiful, yes. You'll forget about that beauty when you're fighting for your life. You understand why I had to stop you, right?" Sam said quietly.

He leaned off the balcony and peered down at the darkness below. He seemed hesitant to look me in the eyes.

"Because if their food suddenly flew off, they would have noticed that we were hiding in that tree. Raptors are very smart creatures, Leaf. They would've set a trap and got us when we were least expecting it," he continued.

I knew he was right. I endangered us the second the thought of rescue entered my head. I felt like a failure for that and I felt like a failure for the slaughter of innocent animals.

"I wasn't thinking. I'm sorry."

He turned around and gave me a faint, fake smile, "You did good with killing those sparrows. I've never seen anyone so accidentally graceful at manslaughter"

I shrugged my shoulders and smiled a real smile.

"I didn't mean to kill any of them," I admitted again.

He burst out laughing.

"I promise I didn't," I firmly stated.

Sam laughed harder than the first time and I joined in. We laughed until tears filled our eyes and our lungs felt empty.

I slept well that night, on a cot made of straw and leaves, in the upstairs bedroom that belonged to Sam's old partner.

"Well look who's finally awake!" Sam called when I climbed down the next morning.

The crack of thunder and pounding of rain was the only reason I was awake.

"I feel like I haven't slept in three days," I yawned as I sat down at the table.

"You haven't. Just because you wake up on the beach when you come back, doesn't mean you sleep," Sam explained when he handed me a wooden cup filled with water.

"You ever hear the phrase, 'you can sleep when you're dead'? Does that apply to people who come back to life? Or is it just for the normal people who don't fight off dinosaurs?" I giggled like a child.

Sam gave me a blank stare and rolled his eyes a little. He unrolled a big, white scroll across the entire table. It was a map of some sorts; it only showed one place, a circular island. It was a perfect circle cut into quarters with different environments.

In the south, sand dunes with little encampments that had a skull and crossbones on them were depicted. I didn't need to guess that meant Bone Men, but there was something else in the center of the southern area, a golden dragon.

In the east, tropical palm trees and waterfalls made it look more magical than a death trap. A gorilla was painted big for that side.

The west had large trees, rocky mountains ,and a little bird symbol, a sparrow with an eye patch painted in the middle. I

'd yet to see the north end of the island, but the map made me glad that I hadn't. Snow capped mountains, frozen lakes, and glaciers made the place seem like a frozen wasteland. In the middle was a pack of grey wolves.

"Are the symbols in the middle of each area the ruling faction?" I asked.

"Yes. They call themselves kings and each think they're more powerful than the other. They've been fighting for over sixty years at this point."

I walked around the table, taking in all the details in the map.

"Dragons in the south, Gorillas in the east, Sparrows in the west, and Wolves in the north. Are you sure we aren't in some kind of fantasy world? Because I definitely remember knights and chivalry being, you know, a part of history class."

Sam looked at me with a familiar look, one of failure and self hate. I'd given it to myself a thousand times over.

"You can call it what you want, but when the world restarted, so did civilization. It wasn't supposed to end up like this, I..." he stopped.

"What did you do? Are you the reason they're all fighting?"

I refused to let him bury this story like he did before the Sparrows showed up.

Sam's eyes turned red with fury and glossy like water.

"It was all one group at one point. I founded a settlement here," he pointed at the very middle of the map where there was a picture of an abandoned town, then continued, "I brought the first survivors here hoping to make a place for us to survive, a home for everyone. We grew to the thousands within a year and some started to call me King.

I liked the title and the power that came with it. That power was a sweet poison that others wanted to taste. For ten years, I served as the King of the Forgotten Island. Then, I lost my head to four of my closest friends: Lycannian Grey, Bruiser Black, Wyatt Gold, and Ava Red. They cut my head off and danced it around on a stick before they all started killing each other."

Sam's fist was clenched so tight that his knuckles were white.

"For sixty years they've been destroying everything that I built. Then, the wardens came around and with them came the life I'd forgotten."

My heart dropped. I jumped out of my seat and slammed my fists on the table. I knew he wasn't telling me something about this place.

"What else have you not told me about this place?"

"Sit down. I wasn't sure if you were ready to hear the truth about what this place is when I first met you, but now I see the fault in that."

I sat back down gently, never breaking eye contact with Sam.

"What is this place, Sam? No bull this time."

Sam took a deep breathe then answered, "The most secure prison on the planet."