The Mighty Megalosaurus

[RedPiggy]

Author’s Note: I don’t own Dinosaurs. That would be Disney. Henson’s Creature Shop made the characters. Earl’s parents, to the best of my knowledge, are never named or showed, so these things I made up. Other than that, I’ll be using mostly characters from the show, just younger, as this is a prequel to the show. All dates are based off of remarks from various characters, though the show is inconsistent in some spots. Also, this fic, like the show, treats animal-like violence rather casually.

PROLOGUE

(60,000,046BC)

“Bump, bump, bump, bada bump, badump, bada badada bada-tadada,” sang quietly a strong male dinosaur with mottled brown and green scales as he bobbed and weaved through the forest, sniffing out his wife. “Bump!” he shouted as he jumped up and stomped a small little mammal, which he promptly picked up and threw down his gullet. He laughed, enjoying the little pancaked mammal as it slid down his throat.

He was a newly wed dinosaur, the first of his family to do so. His wife had looked so wonderful on that day, a slender aquamarine reptilian goddess with flowers around her neck and a small white blouse with a just a hint of a frill on the collar. He finally caught the light scent of her perfume: lavender. He followed it, grinning as widely as his megalosaurus jaws would let him.

“Cayla, my darling,” he began when he finally spotted her in small thicket under the full moon, his eyes twinkling.

She shot up from her spot lying restfully on the ground. She dusted herself off, her eyes wide and her jaw agape. “Amir!” she exclaimed. “How – how – when did you get back?”

He walked over and clutched her tightly. “Yesterday. Those four-footers were ready to listen to my plan to save the trees around the Great Swamp. Isn’t that great?” He caressed her smooth head.

“Lovely,” Cayla agreed sheepishly.

Amir sighed happily. “Cayla, you truly are my crown. You are the most radiant dinosaur I’ve ever met! When you finally lay our first egg, I’ll be able to die happy!”

“Well, you’re in luck, pal,” shouted a beefy orange dinosaur with six tiny horns on the sides of his head. Amir could barely put himself in front of Cayla before the intruder leapt and came down on Amir, forcing him to the ground. “I’m movin’ your happiness up a few years!” he growled confidently as he snapped Amir’s neck.

The victor stood and caressed Cayla. “I thought he was coming back next week.”

Cayla pushed him away angrily. “Jeez, Dominic – did you have to jump him so close to me?” She kicked the body. “I don’t care that your challenge was legal under the Code of the Wilderness – I could have been hurt.” She turned and slapped him. “If you don’t want to be pinned by a tree right now, you need to apologize!”

“What’s your problem?” Dominic exclaimed. “You couldn’t stand the little eco-whiner.” He batted his eyelids and tiptoed around with clasped hands, his voice stereotypically girlish, “Ooh, look at me! I plant seeds for a living! I am one with the sacred environment!” He blew a raspberry. “Big deal. Now he’s compost for this whole thicket. He got his wish. Ooh,” he continued seductively, trying to stroke under her chin, “unless you want to bring him back home for supper.”

Cayla stared at him in disgust.

<><><><><><>

Cayla and Dominic, sometime later, stare at a pale egg with green bands as it hatches. To their surprise, two rather tiny green dinosaur babies, both looking a bit frail, use their combined strength to break free of the egg before spilling out over a table and into their parents’ arms.

<><><><><><>

(60,000,040BC)

The two green dinosaur siblings, each with large disproportionate jaws and a brown stripe going down their backs, throw a talent show for their parents. The boy dinosaur, distinguished from his sister by red and black plaid pajamas, is yelled at by his father, causing the son to hang his head and cut a dirty glance to his sister, dressed in pink pajamas, who is getting kisses and hugs from their mother.

<><><><><><>

(60,000,036BC)

The son, now wearing a red and plaid tank top, stands in front of a blackboard in a one-room schoolhouse, grumbling as he writes “Earl will not protest the use of bulldozers” repeatedly.

<><><><><><>

(60,000,034BC)

Earl is sitting on the floor watching “Mr. Ugh”, a black and white TV show about a talking caveman with shaggy black hair, in his parents’ sparse apartment, while his sister strums a guitar on a nearby sofa with floral cushions. He cringes at her apparently bad attempts at playing. Finally, he jumps up and kicks in the television screen, causing it to go dark.

 

[RedPiggy]

A Father’s Hope

(60,000,033BC)

“Um, Dad, why can’t we go back to the apartment?” Earl asked, rubbing his stomach as they walked to the edge of a forest that was slowly burning from a barely moving lava flow.

Dominic cringed. He cut Earl a sharp glance. “Hey – if I don’t watch out, your mother is gonna have you singin’ and dancin’ and maybe even becoming a,” he said, shuddering, “scholar.”

“What’s so wrong with that?” Earl continued, stopping to stare at a butterfly breaking out of its cocoon.

Dominic whipped around and grabbed Earl by the arm, nearly breaking it. “No son of mine is buyin’ into that whole ‘civilization’ thing,” he demanded. “It’s just one o’ those fad things that’ll fizzle out in anudder year or two.” He let go of Earl’s thin frame. “Tradition is tradition, boy. The old ways were the right ways.”

“But, dinosaurs have been getting civilized for almost a million years now,” Earl protested in a whimper.

Dominic smirked and chuckled. “An’ dinosaurs have been on this earth for hundreds of millions of years.” His voice grew tender. “Don’t you get it, Earl? Dinosaurs survived because they didn’t just do whatever they wanted. They did things ‘cause it was right, not because they just woke up one mornin’ and decided on a new plan.” He patted his son on the back, making the boy flinch. “If you gotta adapt to your environment, that just means you couldn’t cut it naturally.” He continued softly, “Your momma’s spoilin’ Pearl, so if I wanna have any chance at all of havin’ a kid who’ll survive, I gotta teach ya right.”

“Now,” Dominic told his son much later as they reached the smoldering black river of cooling lava, “if you’re goin’ huntin’ the best thing to do is find a spot where they just die off on their own, like this lava flow here.” He tossed a twig onto the black stripe running through the forest, watching as it poofed into smoke on contact.

Earl watched intently. “I thought it was better to kill than just to scavenge, Dad.”

Dominic laughed and heartily slapped his son on the back. “You’re getting’ ahead of yourself, boy,” he said. “You’re just a thirteen year-old kid. You can barely keep your skull up on that thin neck o’ yours. If you just rush into things, you’ll be draggin’ your intestines away from a fight.”

Earl took a big whiff and shuddered. “Dad – the smoke,” he said, gagging, “blocks the smell of nearby prey.”

Dominic leaned back and inhaled deeply, smiling. “Yeah, I love the smell of burning lava in the evening.” He nodded. “That’s the challenge, kid. The rest is up to you.” He sat down and leaned against a tree and started to snore.

Earl looked around. There were hardly any dead animals. Only an idiot would be this close to a lava flow, even if it was slow. The smell alone would have driven away most game. He looked back at his father as he started to wander away.

If only there was a Kave Mart nearby. He could just go “help himself” to a roast and act like he had killed it himself.

Earl wasn’t exactly the best hunter on the super-continent. He was surely no match for his hero, Red Bakker, who was always on television, describing his daring hunts in amazing detail, with an exuberance that always left Earl giddy with delight and an awestruck sigh.

What made Red Bakker even more incredible was that it was one of the only shows he and his father could watch together and enjoy. His father was profoundly against television, claiming it brainwashed the masses into forgetting the old days – but Red Bakker flawlessly connected previous wild generations with current civilized ones. After all, you could put a dinosaur in clothes and under a roof, but you couldn’t take the beast out of him.

Earl felt it before he could see or smell it: a giant of a dinosaur, maybe twenty feet tall or so, was bearing down on him through the forest. From the shape of the shadow, it was definitely a carnivore. He trembled a bit before hearing Bakker’s voice in his head, describing his beachside hunt from last week. A light went off inside his head and he started wagging his tail and dancing around, seemingly oblivious to the approaching predator.

It burst from the trees and Earl dashed as close as he dared to the lava flow. The predator, a large therapod with rough plumage, rumbled out from the trees and stopped, snorting as it came to the stench of sulfur.

Earl’s face fell. When he looked down, he noticed each foot had one large claw in comparison to the other ones. He grimaced. He had heard about that type of dinosaur. They were cold and calculating and way smarter than most. “Hey!” Earl shouted, jumping up and down, “don’t ya wanna eat me?”

The large dromeosaur grimaced. “Ugh, it stinks to high heaven here.” He nodded. “You get a free pass, kid.”

“But, I need you to fall into the lava flow so my Dad’ll think I killed you.”

The predator laughed as he backed away from the stench. “You caught that episode of Bakker too, didn’t you?” he said with a toothy grin. “I can’t believe the predators chasing him actually fell for it.” He cocked his head to one side. “Have you even joined the YMCA yet, kid?”

“No,” Earl replied.

The giant dromeosaur shook his head. “Look, none of the stuff around here’ll be fit to eat. Go join the YMCA. They’ll teach you how to smack down smaller creatures in no time flat. I’d be ashamed of my father if I was you. I mean, how lazy do you have to be not to teach your own offspring how to hunt yourself?” He reached to the back of his curved neck and plucked out a feather, cringing as he did so. He let it drop. “You take that back to your pop with a story of how you avoided getting eaten by a Utahraptor. Then offer to join the Y. That should impress the bum.”

When the Utahraptor left, Earl cautiously picked up the feather and ran back to his father, nearly hopping with joy.

It wasn’t the ending he had hoped for his hunt, but it sure beat getting digested.

Author’s Note: If you haven’t read Robert Bakker’s Raptor Red book, I suggest it. It’s way awesome.

 

[RedPiggy]

La Brea High School

(60,000,033BC)

Sid Turtlepuss, a small brown dinosaur with a tortoise-like face, looked at a small map as he walked down the hallway with Earl. “So,” he said in a high-pitched voice, “Earl: if we were all taught in one room as little kids, then why build a big high school?”

Earl shrugged, lugging a small sack of books across his shoulder. “Maybe it has something to do with that volcano thing down south. Everybody’s migratin’ up here.”

“Huh, guess so,” Sid noted.

Earl walked over to his locker and fiddled with the lock to open it. He tossed the books to the floor. “Why do they have to weigh more than breakfast?” he wondered aloud, rubbing his shoulder. He opened his locker finally and a tidal wave of saltine crackers poured out. A male cackling made Earl and Sid turn around, crunching a pile of crackers underfoot. Earl spotted Pete, a small green long-nosed dinosaur, bunched over, pointing at Earl and laughing. Earl frowned. “Ha ha, Pete.”

Pete Rawn waited until he could catch his breath before responding. “C’mon, Earl … it coulda been the water bucket over the locker gag.”

Earl rolled his eyes and sighed. “But then you wouldn’t be such the comic innovator,” he shot back sarcastically.

Sid elbowed Earl. “Well, at least you got something to eat for lunch today,” he said with a grin.

Earl shook his head. “And get filled up on non-nutritious wafers? What do you want me to do – swell up to the size of a brontosaurus?”

<><><><><><>

Earl sat in math class, tapping his pencil repeatedly as the assignment stared at him tauntingly. He felt someone tap him on the back. A purple needle-nosed dinosaur, wearing thick glasses, whispered, “Hey, Earl, you need some help?”

Earl smirked. “Nah. The formula is pretty straight-forward,” he answered confidently. “It’s just I never understood the question, Ed. It never explains what a train is. Why should we care when two of them reach the station? What kind of manager wouldn’t just make some sort of schedule and demand they get there on time?”

Ed shrugged. Suddenly, his eyes lit up. “Hey, did you get that new horror comic at the bookstore?” Earl frowned and shook his head – his father thought comics were a waste of time. “Well, it tells this story of a hermit Elder who seduces young female dinosaurs and then bites their necks and sucks their blood.” Ed’s grin widened as much as possible. “He looks so cool – I’m gonna base my whole life off him.”

Earl stared at his classmate like he had just bitten off his own hand. “He sucks their blood?”

“Yeah,” Ed noted with excitement.

Earl scratched his head. “He didn’t just get their phone numbers like a normal male?”

Ed sighed and rolled his eyes. “It’s supposed to be romantic, silly.”

Earl shook his head and turned around. “Seems to me he’d get farther in the relationship if he didn’t make them anemic.”

<><><><><><>

Earl sighed, exasperated, as he talked on the phone at the end of the day. “Yeah, Dad – they … they … they want me to stay over.” He put his other hand over his free small ear hole to drown out the bustling crowd of jubilant students. “It’s for the YMCA.” He nodded. “Yeah, I’ve been learning a lot.” He paused as he listened to his father ask him about his grades in school. “Oh, I’ve never put too much thought in that,” he replied with his well-rehearsed answer. “These teachers all want us to conform to the silliest notions like going to work and getting paid. Traditional dinosaurs don’t have to fool with all that nonsense.” He sighed again. “Yeah, but it’s the law. I have to be here. No, Dad, it isn’t a complete waste of time … me an’ the other kids skip out a lot and practice hunting techniques.” He nodded and grinned. “Yeah, I’ll bring ya home a mastodon or something. I’m gettin’ pretty good at slicing them open with my claws.” He paused again. “Thanks, Dad. See ya.”

He hung up. He hated lying to his parents. His mother seemed to praise him at least a little for his grades, but to his father, it was blasphemy.

For millions of years, dinosaurs had scraped by just barely, dying young and living miserable lives. Earl didn’t see why life shouldn’t improve for once. He didn’t always understand the rationale behind the Elders’ judgments, but at least they were trying.

Still, as much as he liked learning, Earl was very much still quite alone. Yeah, there was Sid and half a dozen other students who would talk to him – but they almost always teased him about how frail he was at some point. What was the point of bulking up, anyway?

Nowadays you could just go to a store and pick something up in a box. The refrigerator was a sacred invention that allowed dinosaurs to eat whenever they felt like it.

He understood what his father wanted … but he wondered why civilization was so bad. Surely it couldn’t be. Of course, there were companies like Wesayso, who seemed to trap dinosaurs in low-paying jobs for no other reason than they were bored, but society was or could be so much more.

 

[The Count]

SQUEEEEEEEEEE! ! ! *Glomps der Kellieee! *Loves update, leaves her hot chocolate and piece of chocolate cake.

 

[RedPiggy]

Nah, save the cake for your birthday party. Happy Birthday!

 

[The Count]

Ah, but Ima sharing it with all m' friends in the thread. And you're def one of m' friends. So enjoy the piece. Now if I could finish off a few little things to get m' babies to total 40... Hope to read more story soonish, or at least whenever it's ready.

 

[RedPiggy]

The King

(Late 60,000,033BC)

Pearl Sinclair, wearing a brightly colored blouse, checked her plumping cheeks in her compact mirror as she applied makeup just outside La Brea High School’s gym. Pearl couldn’t wait for the upcoming Refrigerator Day pageant the school would hold in December: she was going to play her guitar and make a name for herself.

Specifically, a last name, like the last name of the stud who always seemed to play the Son in the pageant. When he bended over in front of the prop fridge, she definitely felt a chill….

A commotion in the gym startled her, making her mess up her eyeliner. She opened the large double doors and saw a basketball game that didn’t seem to be going very well. A lone tan tyrannosaur twirled confusedly in circles as other students laughed viciously, stealing the ball from him repeatedly.

After several moments, the tyrannosaur, on the verge of crying, used his huge jaws to knock away the student with the ball and grabbed the ball with his sharp bright white teeth. He clumsily attempted to dribble it, but as the ball bounced back up off the floor, he bit too hard and it hissed as it deflated. Laughter started to turn to yelling and taunting, as the students started to pull their arms into their sleeves and mock the tyrannosaur’s tiny arms.

“Pearl, get outta the way,” Earl’s voice chastised from behind. “I’m late for gym!” He paused, gulping. “Uh, what game are they playing?” he asked timidly, hearing the heated arguments inside.

Pearl turned around and looked her brother up and down, smirking at the sight of her twin brother in a jersey that nearly swallowed him. “Basketball.”

Earl sighed in relief. “Good – whenever we play baseball, the guys always try to use me as the bat.”

Pearl put her hand up to stop him. “It’s getting rough in there, Earl. Maybe you oughta go back to Lit class and compose a ballad or somethin’.”

Earl stared at her in disbelief. “Pearl, I’m not fragile. Besides,” he continued, waving at her dismissively, “basketball’s a bloodless sport.”

<><><><><><>

The tyrannosaur bellowed as he slipped in a pool of blood forming from the group of students who were all biting and scratching, landing with a squeak and a thud. Some hunkered down, stalking him, just about to pounce. Others were too busy fighting other students.

“Pull off the arms!” one cried. “Make him more aerodynamic!”

The terrified tyrannosaur clenched his eyes shut as a small group of dinosaurs jumped up to attack his quivering frame as it lay on the floor. He cringed as he felt the weight of his attackers, hearing the crunching and blood-curdling screaming.

“I said, ‘Leave him alone!’” shrieked a tense male voice.

Suddenly the weight lifted off and the tyrannosaur cracked open an eyelid. To his shock, a small green and brown megalosaurus was getting a beating, bite marks scattered all over his tail and arms.

“We’ll teach ya to protect Stubby,” growled a muscular student, throwing the megalosaurus high into the air, toward the basket. He slipped through, dislocating his shoulder with a crack and landing with another crack. The jock sneered and called off the attack. “That’s enough boys,” he announced. “If we kill ‘em we’ll all get pulled from the team. Let’s let Mr. Overachiever and Stubby clean up the mess – if Stubby over there can handle a mop!” The students laughed and walked out of the gym.

<><><><><><>

In the small nurse’s office, a fat brown female ceratopsian in a crisp white dress finished bandaging the aching and woozy megalosaurus. She popped him on the head with her palm and spoke in a crusty voice. “That’s not a good way to get into the playoffs, moron. Dinosaurs only sanction violence in three sports: soccer, hockey, and boxing.”

“What about pro wrestling?” questioned the tyrannosaur as he sat in a chair nearby, not nearly as injured as the megalosaurus.

The nurse snorted. “Fake sports don’t count,” she replied curtly before leaving the office.

The tyrannosaur watched as the megalosaurus male cringed with every movement, especially when he tried to touch his scalp. “Uh, t’anks,” the tyrannosaur offered finally, fidgeting in his seat a little. “If you hadn’t jumped in dere just then, I would been part of the school menu by now.”

The megalosaurus looked up and grinned, revealing a few cracked or missing teeth. “We still might be … this was only second period.”

“I’m Roy,” the tyrannosaur told him.

“Earl – pleased to meet ya, considerin’ the circumstances.”

Roy stared at Earl’s head. “Don’t that hurt?”

Earl shrugged, maintaining his smile. “Nah,” he said, trying to avoid cringing. “I got a thick skull – what could possibly go wrong?”

Roy looked down at the ground, his voice starting to waiver. “I guess you could lose a few IQ points – all because o’ me.”

Earl stared at Roy. Roy seemed so depressed, like he had completely been destroyed – even if he hadn’t been eaten. Earl glanced up at the ceiling and chuckled. “Ah, I ain’t got that much to lose. School’s not really my proudest environment.”

Roy glanced up in confusion. “But – they said --.”

Earl shook his head slightly, a compassionate (though swollen) look on his face. “Those jerks say a lot o’ things, Roy,” he told his depressed new friend. “I usually get C’s and D’s – I just put little marks on the sides to make them A’s and B’s.”

“Really?” Roy asked with wide eyes.

“Yeah – we gotta make our own successes,” Earl replied, hoping he wasn’t hesitating and revealing the improvisation. “At least, that’s what my dad always tells me.” He eased down and limped over to Roy, placing a hand tenderly on the tyrannosaur’s narrow shoulders. “Guys like us don’t just get handed success on a silver platter.”

Roy shook his head and stared at the floor. “Nah, I guess not. I’ve been on my own for awhile now – no one to look after me.” He glanced up at Earl with a sheepish expression. “You got a family, Earl?”

Earl shrugged. “Yeah, but you’re not missin’ nothin’.” He looked away wistfully. “Family or not – that’s somethin’ you get stuck with. You don’t have any say in the matter. You’re just a tiny leaf getting carried away by the wind, unable to do anything about it.” He looked back at Roy and smiled as warmly as he could. “But friendship – that’s something you can choose, Roy. It’s like a buffet table – you look around and pick the stuff that tastes the best to you. Or at least won’t make you puke, whichever,” he added under his breath.

“So – you picked me?” Roy asked innocently and hopefully.

Earl nodded. “A normal carnivore like you would just rip off the other guys’ arms to let them know how it felt.” He pointed at Roy. “You begged them to stop.”

Roy averted his gaze. “So … I’m a coward.”

Earl sighed. “No, Roy, you aren’t a coward. You wanted those guys to change for the better – to not go with their primal instincts and live more civilized lives.” He nodded. “It – speaks to me.”

“What does it say?” Roy asked, hope starting to return to his bitter voice.

Earl smiled. “It says, ‘I think this is the beginning of a beautiful friendship’.”

 

[RedPiggy]

I haven't forgotten this story. Thanks to the Count, I've finally been able to plot out the rest of this fic.
Arc 1: Intro (done)
Arc 2: The Code (60,000,030BC)
Arc 3: Civilization (60,000,023BC)

So, there are six more chapters coming of various lengths. I just have to write them.

 

[RedPiggy]

Four-footed Love

(60,000,030BC)

Pearl stared at the mirror in the female’s bathroom. At sixteen, she was now rather hefty, at least 200 pounds heavier than Earl, but instead of hating herself, Pearl actually liked the look. She trembled with anticipation as she put on her makeup. Over the last few years, dinosaurs, both two-footer and four-footer alike, had started living on this side of the Great Swamp, making the Elders and dinosaurs like her father nervous.

She didn’t know why, but Willie the titanosaur, a hulking gray behemoth with pale stripes, made her heart flutter. It had been hard for him and other four-footers to adjust and public buildings and other parts of the infrastructure just couldn’t seem to keep up. Last year, a diplodocus ninth-grader died when her head smacked into the concrete undersides of the new bridge.

Earl wasn’t a big fan of four-footers, but after the funeral, he seemed rather upset. It wasn’t until after New Year’s that he told her in secret that he had been worried about his friend Roy, who hadn’t been seen for months. Earl saw that he had been abnormally quiet and downcast, so he was terrified that Roy would do something awful.

Pearl wished she had a friend as loyal as Roy, though she hadn’t really had the opportunity to meet him for very long. From the stories Earl told, he was very sweet (though Earl didn’t say it that way … he had said Roy was “open to anything”) and compassionate.

Pearl didn’t have that. Her mother wanted her to be the next female business dinosaur, in the vein of Ethyl Phillips, who was one of the first females to break out of the domestic drudgery and climb up the professional ladder. Pearl did admire Mrs. Phillips in a way, though she didn’t want to be a business dinosaur like her own mother wanted. She liked how Mr. Phillips encouraged his wife to succeed, unlike Pearl’s father, who derided her at every turn. He was stern to Earl as well – all because they wanted to stay civilized and not go back to risking their health every waking moment. Life was meant to be enjoyed. Dreams were meant to be followed.

Males were meant to be wooed.

Earl, though, didn’t seem to have a romantic bone in his body.

<><><><><><>

Earl, now a lean yet athletic Megalosaurus, slapped on another ten-pound weight and started pulling on the handles of the gym equipment.

“Hey,” came a quiet, deep voice.

Earl stopped and wiped himself with a small towel. His eyes brightened. “Roy!” He rushed over to his long-missing friend. “What happened? I’ve been worried sick!”

Roy stood back uncomfortably. “You – you have?”

“Yeah,” Earl replied, nodding. “You just up and left and I didn’t know if you were okay or eaten or what!”

Roy blushed and stared at the floor, grinning. “Well, t’anks for bein’ worried, pally-boy. I just couldn’t stick around after the funeral.” He looked at Earl, confused. “What started the exercise routine? You look … good,” he told his friend bashfully.

Earl smiled, his molars having been replaced with gold bridge work after he got beaten up when he and Roy first met. He slapped a hand on Roy’s slender shoulder. “I’m gonna do it, Roy. I’m gonna get me a girlfriend and tell my ol’ man off.”

Roy gawked at Earl. “Well, dat’s a shock. What’d I miss?”

Earl turned and went back to weightlifting, grunting every once in awhile. “We learned about the Code of the Wilderness earlier this spring.” He paused, gritting his teeth as he let the weights down. “A teen male can challenge his father for supremacy.” He stopped and sat back up, wiping the sweat off his face. “I didn’t understand all the details – you know me, I’m a mess when it comes to complicated things – but I think I get the gist. I’m tired of him yellin’ at me all the time, Roy,” he continued. “I’m gonna gain a thousand pounds of rock-hard muscle and teach him a thing or two about the Code.”

Roy kept staring at him. “Are you sure you wanna do dis, pally-boy? I mean, he’s your old man. I ain’t had a father for years. Are you sure you can just throw yours away?”

“I’m gonna have to dump him off a cliff earlier than expected, that’s all,” Earl told him. “I’d have to do it when he turns seventy-two anyway.” He started lifting weights, smiling at his plan. “Why wait?”

Roy shrugged. “I guess procrastination is an undesirable trait,” he offered finally.

Earl nodded, straining. “Exactly. If my father taught me anything, he taught me that a dinosaur has to take his life into his own hands. He wants to live like wild dinosaurs? Then he can die like one.” He paused to catch his breath. “Besides, I can kill two birds with one stone if I gain muscle: I can put an end to my father’s whining and I can score some female who’ll drool over my abs of steel and then make me some dinner afterward.”

<><><><><><>

“I said no and that’s final!” barked Dominic as he dragged some thousand-pound meat toward the front door of the apartment. “I’ve kept my mouth shut about a lot o’ things, Pearl --.”

“You don’t waste a single word on keepin’ me in line!” protested Pearl angrily.


“And it’s better for you since I don’t,” he shot back. “Your mother may spoil you rotten, but the Code of the Wilderness states a parent’s supposed to ensure the survivability of its offspring. You’re not datin’ some darn four-footer and that’s that!”

“But Pa --!”

“Don’t ‘Pa’ me, Pearl,” Dominic grunted as he stopped. He growled at her. “What exactly did you have planned for this ‘relationship’ anyway? If you wanna have kids someday, you gotta stick to your own kind.”

“You an’ Ma are different species,” retorted Pearl, her hands on her thick hips.

Dominic rolled his eyes. “That’s different. We still fit, if you get my meanin’.”

Pearl scoffed and rolled her eyes, crossing her arms in indignation. “If I can’t date Willie, then I’m leaving.”

Her father wiped his nose and pointed at the door. “See that door right there? It’s not forcin’ ya to go through it.”

Cayla, dressed in a purple gown, walked out of the door with a look of concern. “What is going on out here?”

“Your daughter’s finally cracked wide open,” replied her husband angrily. “Either that, or I’ll do it for her.”

Pearl inched closer to her mother. “Mama, Papa won’t let me just be me. I love Willie and we’re going to spend the rest of our lives together, no matter what Papa thinks.”

“It ain’t natural and sooner or later you’ll find that out,” grumbled Dominic.

Cayla frowned. “I’m not seeing this family get torn apart.” Before Dominic could respond, she continued, “I don’t care what our ancestors did. They may not have had the concept of committed families --.”

“You need to commit her,” Dominic argued, pointing at Pearl.

Cayla shook her finger at him. “Don’t interrupt me, Papa,” she snarled. “This whole nuclear family thing is new, but I want it. That means no one leaves unless they’re dead or married.”

“See?” Pearl boasted at her father.

“No, Pearl,” Cayla replied, “that wasn’t permission. Your father may not be advising you in the most loving way, but he’s right. It won’t last. It can’t last. You need to turn off the valve of that little pipe dream. I’m sorry, Hon.”

 

[The Count]

Yaey! *Huggles.