End Game

End Game
Ep4-trex-01-px
Non-avian dinosaurs featured	Tyrannosaurus, Pachycephalosaurus, Troodon, Ankylosaurus, Triceratops
Other pre-historic creatures	Quetzalcoatlus
Modern creatures featured	Mammals, pigeons, geese
Time line	Late Cretaceous
Main characters	Tyrannosaurus, Troodon

End Game is the fourth and the final episode of Dinosaur Revolution. It tells the story of survival for a family of Tyrannosaurus rex in the final years before the impact of a meteorite that would result in the extincion of most of the dinosaurs. Luckily, the birds of the Mesozoic have survived and evolved into modern birds.

The Tyrannosaurus Jack Palance.

Stumpy paining by his lost arm.

Stumpy and Jack Palance fighting by territory.

Plot

65 million years ago

During the late Cretaceous Period, and a decade before the impact of the meteorite that would result in the death of the dinosaurs, two adult male Tyrannosaurus Rexes, named Stumpy and Jack Palance, are battling for territory on a beach that is now Montana. They charge into each other, and Jack Palance bites Stumpy's right arm off. Wounded and bleeding, Stumpy has no choice but to relinquish the territory to Jack Palance, who roars in triumph.

One year later, Stumpy and his mate Tinkerbelle watch their two young Rexes wrestle in the nest. The baby Rexes' attention soon turns to a Pachycephalosaurus, which they chase away from the nest and past a pair of Troodons. After a few minutes, they both get lost, and the two juveniles fight over a pine cone that fell onto the ground. However, they have no idea that Jack Palance is standing over them, waiting to pounce. Finally, when the two baby Rexes look up, it is too late, and Jack Palance strikes in the blink of an eye. Back at the nest, Stumpy and Tinkerbelle hear the commotion and rush over. When they find the carnage, Tinkerbelle roars in a fiery fury, swearing vengeance on the deaths of her young. Later that night, Stumpy tries his best to comfort Tinkerbelle, and when the next morning rolls around, it takes him much effort to motivate her to get up to go huting.

Together, Stumpy and Tinkerbelle take down a Triceratops, and begin to feast. Stumpy soon smells something unusual in the air, and he is right. When Tinkerbelle peeks over her back, she glimpses Jack Palance staring right back at her. Stumpy steps forward, ready to protect Tinkerbelle and their lunch with his life. The Rexes charge and snap their jaws against each other, resulting in some broken teeth. However, because he is bigger, Jack Palance recovers quicker and targets Stumpy's vulnerable neck. Stumpy roars in pain while Jack Palance switches targets, and goes for his left arm instead. However, Tinkerbelle intercedes and bites Jack Palance's thigh, giving Stumpy some time to recover. When Stumpy finally gets up, he bashes Jack Palance, who falls back and is impaled through the neck by the Triceratops' horn (similar to Last Day of the Dinosaurs). As Jack Palance dies, the couple resume feasting. That night, as the Rexes cuddle, Tinkerbelle stands up, indicating that she is ready to mate. Stumpy follows through, and the couple mate successfully.

A couple months later, Tinkerbelle lays eggs in her nest. She defecates on the nest. Stumpy takes a look at the nest, but Tinkerbelle wants privacy. It will be a tough and dangerous journey for the couple to keep their eggs and young alive. Stumpy decides to go hunting while Tinkerbelle watches the eggs. It soon rains, while Tinkerbelle sleeps, water begins to flood the nest. Since the eggs are porous to allow the embryo to breathe, the water can cause them to drown. However, Tinkerbelle heard the water in the nest, and uses her clawed toes to dig a hole in the nest to allow the water to flow out. Later that night, a pack of five Troodons quietly sneak up to the nest. Their goal is to steal an egg that has rolled outside of the nest after Tinkerbelle made a hole in the nest to prevent the eggs from drowning. As soon as one of the male troodons grabs the egg, Stumpy throws him up in the air, and crushes him with his teeth. The egg drops and cracks, but the rest of the pack run for their lives as Stumpy gives chase. Tinkerbelle wakes up to the noise and finds the cracked egg. Stumpy returns back to the nest, with the dead Troodon in his mouth. The eggs grow quickly. Not long after, Tinkerbelle hears squeaking in the nest, believing it to be the hatched Rexlings. However, it is revealed to be rodents, who ate all but one of the eggs. As Stumpy walks away and lets Tinkerbelle deal with the situation. But one egg survived, and Tinkerbelle carefully cradles the egg in her mouth. Stumpy returns, and just like magic, a baby Rex, named Junior, is born.

Nine years later, and one hour before the impact, Stumpy and Tinkerbelle lie and sleep. Junior, who is an adolescent teenager, runs around and curiously gazes upon an old Ankylosaurus taking a drink, along with the same pair of Troodons that Stumpy's previous kids passed by. Junior plays with the Ankylosaurus, but he whacks Junior with his tail club. When Junior gets back up, he chases the Troodons into a cave right when the impact occurs. The meteorite, which is six miles across, flies into the atmosphere at a speed of 12.4 miles a second. It lands in the north of the Yucatan Peninsula, and creates a crater 88 miles wide and 19 miles deep, and the blast itself was equivalent to one billion Hiroshima bombs. The impact caused massive tsunamis, global wildfires, increased volcanic activity, and huge earthquakes. What occured after was the perhaps the closest example to a nuclear winter. Temperatures dropped so low that snow began to fall. The dust rising from the impact cloaked the world in darkness, causing the flora to die. Since the herbivores had nothing to eat, they starved, followed quickly by the carnivores. However, life did not wipe out instantaneously.

One month after the impact, Junior is starving, and soon finds out that his parents are dead. But he is quickly distracted by a rodent, which he tries to catch and eat. But he misses, and falls off a cliff and hurts himself, and starts to bleed out. Meanwhile, a group of Troodons are at their nesting sites. The two Troodons that were chased into the cave by Junior were waiting for their eggs to be layed. But a mix of sulfur and carbon evaporates into the earth's atmosphere, the pair of Troodons run into a cave for saftey, while the rest are trapped and asphyxiated by the chemicals. The surviving pair finally layed their eggs. Male Troodons, like with penguins and ostriches, took care of the eggs, while the females went to look for food. The female searches for anything to eat, from a leaf to a cockaoach. The female Troodon, still looking for food, discovers Junior's body. The male calls for her, but she is well out of the range of his call, she can't hear him due to the loud wind, and begins to get close too Junior. She eventually falls asleep. After she wakes up, the Troodon realizes that it's snowing. She returns to find that her mate has been frozen solid, along with all of her eggs as well. All but one. Alone, starving, and freezing, she takes the one egg to the only place warm and safe enough to nest: Junior's mouth.

Despite dinosaurs going extinct, birds survived the mass extinction. From pigeons to ducks. From Falcons to seagulls. They are all descendants of the once mighty reptiles that ruled the planet for 135 million years. So the next time you get ready to eat a chicken, turkey, duck, or any bird, just think of what that bird's great ancestors could do to you.