Chapter 5 - Inside The Speed Force Part II

Axxel rolled and crawled through the log with haste; he barely managed to exit the other side of the hollow log before the T-Rex's massive jaw bit a chunk out of the thick wooden coverings. There was a crunch that sent a chill down Axxel's spine.

'That could have been me.'

Still, he was a man on a mission, and right now, Axxel's mission was rather plane…

"TO SURVIVE!"

Axxel's bellow was provocative, and it seemed his provocation had served its purpose when the Mechanized Monstrosity roared back in defiance. After all, while angering the beast was ill-advised, an angry enemy was much preferred to a calm enemy.

'Unless the enemy is a Super Saiyan.'

Axxel swerved between trees, trudged through mud pits, leaped over the deep crevices, and swam across three rivers to get away from the Mechanized Monstrosity, but nothing he did could evade the T-Rex stalking him.

At some point, Axxel was sure it had become but a game for the creature.

Twenty of his steps were worth one of the T-Rex's. Physically speaking, there was no way he could escape. Maneuverability was no issue for a mechanical creature filled with futuristic technology the like Axxel could no phantom.

And things were getting worse by the second.

By now, the poop that had been disguising Axxel's scent had been all but washed away, so the T-Rex – master tracker on a bad day – had to spare little effort to track a Speedless-Speedster with a thick scent of fluffy apples.

Axxel had noticed it for a while, but it became more apparent by the second – he smelled of apples and a different kind of apple at that. He ran and ran, taking note of the steep dropping rapidly approaching from ahead.

A series of rocky cliffs were a couple of hundred meters ahead, but that would hinder Axxel as much as it would hinder his chaser. At this point, it was bound to become a battle of wills. Judging by the fact that the T-Rex could chew through granite, Axxel didn't have to think very hard to realize he would soon be at a disadvantage.

'Unless…'

Unless – like the creative Marine he is – Axxel decided to take a shortcut.

Axxel mentally prayed to all the Gods he knew – which was not a lot – and dashed towards the cliff's edge, directly leaping into the open air instead of carefully climbing down. Someone else would think twice before jumping, but even when he was powerless, Axxel had been leaping off cliffs, so there was no need to stop now.

It was a little above a hundred-foot drop. As his body cut through the air, diving into the inevitable collision with the ground, Axxel was hoping beyond all hope that his new physique could manage such a fall.

Axxel's stomach churned and twisted, but he kept steady in the air while falling, trying to stick the cool hero landing that would bolster his confidence. There was something profoundly uplifting about sticking a hero-landing.

Yet, what he got for all his efforts was anything but heroic.

Around twenty feet from the ground, Axxel lost his balance as he encountered a thick branch, and what followed was a belly flop unlike any other in history. Of course, the first collision was followed by three more branches, hitting Axxel in the back, face, and butt.

Finally, he face-planted onto the muddy ground beneath the cliff.

Axxel suffocated for a couple of seconds before rolling over, concentrating his swollen eyes on the edge of the cliff where he could barely make out the Mechanized Monstrosity circling near the edges.

It seemed his gamble had paid off. The creature didn't have the will to take a leap of faith as he had. Surprisingly, Axxel had found that even after his hard fall, the egg in his embrace did not break.

"Weak-willed motherfucker!" Axxel scoffed and shot a disdainful glance at the T-Rex atop the cliff. "Best not to tempt faith anymore."

However, no sooner did Axxel's confidence reach new heights, than the T-Rex sprouted mechanical wings from its back, soaring into the skies with an ease that could only be considered mocking.

Axxel was back on his feet and running before any conscious thoughts could form in his mind, but sadly, he didn't make it very far. A huge talon wrapped around his body, snatching him up and soaring into the skies.

And, of course, this was not the T-Rex, that would be far too convenient for someone as unlucky as Axxel. The moment he gazed up and identified his kidnapper, Axxel couldn't help but sigh in defeat. A Pterodactyl as equally massive as the T-Rex soared through the air.

Axxel finally realized his earlier blind spot.

In his eagerness to get away from the Mechanized T-Rex, he had failed to pay attention to the several other creatures lurking in the shadows, soaring in the skies, and prowling between branches of massive trees.

"AAARRRRGGGGGHHHHH!"

Axxel groaned as his fingers pried into the crevices of the Pterodactyl's claws, trying and failing to break free from the creature; His fingers bled, and the air lashed against his face was suffocating, but there was no escape.

That's when Axxel's luck decided to make a miraculous comeback.

As divine intervention – more like Speed Force intervention – would have it, there was someone even more reluctant than Axxel to see his capture.

---BOOOOOOOOM---

The T-Rex and Pterodactyl clashed in the air, causing a brief lapse in the Pterodactyl's grip – something that Axxel exploited with all his might. His physique shone at this moment, granting him the strength to pry something akin to iron away from his body.

The egg slipped from Axxel's fingers, but the food was the last thing on his mind.

Axxel spun through the air, trying to maneuver himself against the wind. As soon as he was able to regain some semblance of control, he twirled in the air to see potential landing zones. Honestly, Axxel didn't like his chance of surviving any sort of landing, but it was foolish to give up without knowing the limits of his current physique.

A vast expanse of ocean splashed below, and Axxel released a breath he had been holding. Falling from this height would make the water as hard as concrete for a split second, but that was at least somewhat survivable.

There was also a question that needed to be asked.

"How the fuck is there an ocean inside the Speed Force?"

The more Axxel thought about it, the more he understood – this was simply the Speed Force doing what the Speed Force did best – breaking The Laws of Physics. Fifty meters above the water, Axxel could already taste the sweetness of freedom on the tip of his tongue.

---CHUMP---

However, never would he have expected an Oceanic Monstrosity – a Leviathan – to burst out of the water, opening its maw and swallowing him entirely before he could react. Then, the creature sunk back into the depths of the ocean before the T-Rex of Pterodactyl could even take notice.

----------------------

A couple of hours later, Axxel sat up inside the stomach of the beast, grogginess fading from his disoriented mind.

"I guess it's two bad lucks for every good luck," Axxel sighed as he dipped his finger in the green stomach acid rising to digest him whole.

'Literally the belly of the beast.'

It was stuff like this that didn't show up on the wikis, or maybe, Axxel just didn't read enough. Either way, he was aware that he couldn't walk sideways like he owned the Dc Universe, not that Axxel had planned to do so in the first place.

The stomach of the Leviathan was as large as a small house.

Undigested bones loitered the stomach walls, and the putrid scent of melting flesh ensured that Axxel took as few breaths as possible. He expected to find undigested bones, and maybe even a treasure chest or two, but he didn't expect to see a tent pitched a couple of feet away.

Opening the tent and examining the contents inside yielded a detailed anatomy diagram of the Leviathan, and the bones of the person, who Axxel assumed drew the diagram at some point in the past. Obviously, the person who drew the diagram was not able to escape.

Such a thing didn't bode well for Axxel.

It took Axxel a couple of minutes to decipher the diagram, and within the hour, he already had a plan on how to escape the belly of the beast.

"Don't worry little guy, we will get out of here soon," Axxel comforted the egg that had somehow remained by his side this entire time. "I don't plan to make an omelet out of you anymore."

Admittedly, it was mostly because the egg's shell was impenetrable, and not because Axxel was any less famished. Finished with his preparations, Axxel walked to the stomach wall and carefully felt for any protrusions that could indicate the gland drawn on the diagram.

After finding the gland, all Axxel had to do was squeeze slightly, but in his eagerness to get out, Axxel didn't just squeeze, he squashed the entire gland in his hand like an unhardened clay pot.

---BOOOOOOM---

Water pooled into the Leviathan's stomach, and the pressure built until a hole opened above Axxel's head, tearing the stomach wall a bit. Then, he was gone… pushed to the surface by a strong water pressure that caused his skin to burn as if it was on fire.

---UUUUUUWWWWWWWEEEEEEE---

The Creature made a siren-like sound that irritated Axxel's ears, forcing his mind into unconsciousness. Then, a couple of seconds later there was absolute silence.

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"Uhuh – uhuh – uhuh!"

Axxel coughed up mouthfuls of water as he crawled onto the sandy shore, more exhausted than he had been in his entire life. Immediately rolling over and dying would not be an exaggeration, since – in this case – there was a very real chance of that happening.

Actually, Axxel was sure that he would have drowned had it not been for his trusty floaty device – the egg in his arms. The first thing he was taught in the Marines was how to survive, and the most important rule was 'lack of resources doesn't kill… loneliness kills.'

Since the Marines, Axxel ensured that he kept something from each mission – anything that could occupy his mind as if it was a person, and now, the egg served such a purpose. Axxel closed his eyes and thought about everything that happened since he woke up in The Savage Word.

His endurance had been pushed to its limits, the stability of his mind had been questioned again and again, and the resourcefulness of a Marine had been stretched to the limits of a dollar. And the worse part of the entire thing was – Axxel had an inkling that his tribulations were far from over.

Axxel was tempted to just rest for a couple of minutes, staring up at the Speed Force beyond the skies until death would eventually come for him… alas, both his body and mind refused to submit. Of course, this was not the worse Axxel had experienced in his 26 years of life – plus however old this body was – but it was pretty close to the ultimate nightmare at this point.

Axxel pushed himself onto the shore, tossing the egg away since it had served its purpose of keeping him afloat for the worse of it. Using the opportunity of a reflective surface nearby, Axxel finally got a look at his features.

Silver hair, brown eyes, around six feet three inches, well-toned body, brown-skinned, and a large tattoo of a tree spreading across the entirety of his chest and back. Of course, the red burn from Darkseid's Omega Beam stretched across Axxel's chest, making a rather pleasant tattoo seem unpleasant.

Seeing the tattoo that moved as if it was alive, and the red burn that no doubt contained some kind of infection, Axxel knew no reprieve would find him any time soon. It was as if the world was pushing everything onto his shoulders.

"Now I know how most heroes feel."

Axxel gazed at the ocean, aware – from his wiki knowledge – that there were three known Islands in the Speed Force. He instantly began calculating the odds of swimming to another Island inside the Speed Force – a less shitty one.

Unfortunately, Axxel couldn't swim that far, and even if he could, the swim direction would still be an issue. Which way was the right way?

---SHUFFLE---

---SHUFFLE---

---SHUFFLE---

The moment Axxel was about to release the tenseness from his shoulder, the bushes of the jungle shuffled and five cybernetically-enhanced Velociraptors made their presence known. The Velociraptors were a little over six feet tall, with a blue spiral pattern stretching over the entirety of their bodies.

Axxel eyed the creatures, and they, in turn, eyed him back.

Out of the five creatures in front of him, Axxel was immediately able to determine that only one was a threat, not because the others were weaker, but because that one was the Alpha. And it was definitely intelligent.

The first two Velociraptors stepped forward in tandem, but Axxel was more concerned about those that remained behind. The weakest Velociraptors went first – a typical test to be certain of the target's strength before committing to the kill.

Then… the battle for survival began anew.