No Time For Dinosaurs

by John Benjamin Sciarra

  Something broke through the surface of the water directly in front of him. An enormous head with yellow eyes stared back with a look of surprise on its face.

  ***

  Again, the old saying of his mother came to mind: “Out of the frying pan and into the fire.” Only this time it was out of the fire and into the inferno. Hopelessly trapped, he waited for the creature to snap his head off or swallow him whole or whatever it was going to do. Kyle closed his eyes and waited, and waited, but nothing was happening. Slowly he opened his eyes.

  The water monster was still there, but next to it were several smaller heads. Oh great, it appears the whole family is eating out and I’m the main course!

  One of the smaller animals began to move cautiously around Kyle. Two others moved in the opposite direction. The larger monster stayed perfectly still. Kyle thought they resembled a dolphin, but there wasn’t any blowhole. It had slits down each side of its neck. It did have a perpetual smile on its face, but Kyle wasn’t about to believe that it was all that happy to see him. Again, as with the raptors, he decided to try an offensive move. However, instead of being aggressive, he swam toward one of the smaller animals and reached his hand out to touch it. It disappeared below the surface.

  When Kyle looked around to see what happened to the others, he noticed that they too were gone. The larger monster moved toward Kyle and nudged him. Its head was the size of a Volkswagen beetle. Kyle reached out and gently stroked its head. The monster nudged Kyle again. It was only then that Kyle realized its mouth was very tiny. He doubted he could even get his fist in the mouth reminiscent of a seahorse—long but tiny compared to its body.

  The smaller creatures returned and it was the same with them—small mouths. They appeared to be bolder with Kyle near the larger one and swam over to him. Gently he reached out and touched one on the nose. It stayed. The others all got in the act and began to nuzzle Kyle. He petted them all including the larger one. After a few minutes, Kyle decided enough was enough and headed for the shore. The larger one, Kyle assumed was the mother, blocked his way. Now he became alarmed. Although they weren’t aggressive, he was in danger of exhaustion. He really didn’t expect the animals would be able to comprehend his inability to submerge as they could.

  Suddenly, a high-pitched whistle came out of the mouth of the mother startling him. Its eyes, softer than when it first approached, had now become cold and hard again. While these creatures didn’t have any teeth, it was clear to Kyle they could easily drag him below the surface and drown him. Kyle shoved the mother aside with as much force as he could muster. She didn’t budge.

  The large beast whistled loudly again and the babies disappeared below the surface with barely a splash. As to exactly what was going on, Kyle was clueless. Now it was only the mother and him. She whistled angrily at Kyle and the sound hurt his ears. Disharmony. Something is wrong. Loud noises indicated that something was not in tune with the physical universe. However, if he didn’t get to shore soon, he was going to be in disharmony with the universe.

  Then he heard it. A hiss from behind the large docile animal. On the opposite shore, the raptors gathered and were waiting for the rest of their dinner. The shirt had served as only a poor appetizer. Was the creature actually trying to protect him he wondered? Perhaps it had adopted him and was trying to convince him to dive. The animal didn’t know that wasn’t an option open to Kyle, but she seemed intent on protecting him.

  She whistled again, more loudly this time and nudged him. Even if he wanted to dive below the surface, he couldn’t. He was just too tired and out of breath. The creature shook its head and dove below the surface. Now Kyle was alone. He couldn’t swim across the pond anymore since the raptors were there. If he emerged from where he had entered the first time, it was a simple matter for them to run around the pond and chase him down.

  He looked in the direction of the raptors and tried to come up with a solution. Then without any warning, an enormous beast the size of a school bus flew out of the water and landed on several of the raptors. Two of them escaped screaming as they headed in the opposite direction. Kyle hadn’t realized just how large the creature was. He decided to head back across the pond before the docile monster decided to take him home to be a part of the family.

  He crawled out onto the shore and crashed onto the stiff blades of grass when he heard a gentle whistle behind him. The mother’s head was resting on the shore behind him—her eyes soft pools of gold and yellow once again. Kyle reached over and patted the enormous head.

  “Thanks, girl. Sorry I can’t join you…although part of me wishes I could. I wouldn’t mind having you around to protect me.”

  Three little heads popped up again behind their mother. All of them were whistling—in perfect harmony.

  ***

  The unusual creatures went back to the depths of the pond. Kyle wondered just how deep it must be to house such huge creatures. As he thought about it, he heard the cracking sound of a branch from behind him. Nearly ready to leap back into the water, he began laughing at the creature that was bopping up and down, bending low to the ground, and hissing. It was almost as if Priti were pretending to be a velociraptor.

  Kyle sat down and Priti came over and put her head in his lap. He scratched the rough, leather-like feathers and Priti cooed and purred a deep gurgling sound.

  “Come on, Priti. We have to get to the capsule. You and I have a date with the future, baby! At least I hope we do.”

  ***

  Dr. Donavan didn’t say anything to anyone, not even his partner, about what he was about to do. He was sure someone would try to stop him. He knew they wouldn’t understand and he didn’t have time to explain it.

  It had taken him all night to work out the disruptor and key in the opposite frequency for every set of harmonics in the computer. The device had taken virtually all of the remaining space on the banks of hard drives in the system to come up with the data. Once he disrupted the field, the shoestring would materialize and he would be able to remove it. The capsule would then complete its journey, but Kyle would never be able to return to the same time period ever again. He would be lost and have to live his life out in the past. Life would go on oblivious to the sacrifice he was about to make and his son’s sacrifice would go unnoticed.

  Dr. Donavan stood before the door to the vault with the disruptor in his hand. It was the size of a small transistor radio. The sound was concentrated to shoot straight out of the laser beam he had attached to the front of the device. The concentrated beam of discordant sounds—a match for every harmonic frequency the capsule created—would dissolve. The string would return along with the empty capsule.

  There was always the possibility of going back in time after that and rescuing Kyle—if they could pinpoint the exact moment. It was the only hope he had. But if he was too late…

  Dr. Donavan felt himself give way to tears. Large ones pooled under his eyes and fell to the floor. He only hoped his wife would forgive him for what he was about to do.

  The vault door opened and Dr. Donavan went in. He placed the disruptor as close to the string as possible and set the timer. Then he left. In thirty seconds, Kyle was going to be stranded in the past some 65 million years ago.

  Chapter Twenty-Six

  Priti followed Kyle as he headed back to the distortion field. She occasionally ran up, grabbed his pant leg, and pulled. Kyle had already lost his shirt.

  “Knock it off doof-a-saurus! You want me to call you that instead of Priti? Huh? Do ya?”

  He looked around. There weren’t any other dinosaurs in sight. “Come on Priti. Wanna see Teresa and Sonja?” Priti cocked her head as if trying to understand him. “You can’t remember them. But you will. No doubt, you’ll be treated real nice. They’re going to be surprised to see you!”

  Not twenty yards from the distortion field, it appeared their good fortune had come to an end. The two raptors that had escaped were standing next to the distortion field and it looked like they were hungr
ier than ever.

  ***

  Dr. Donavan watched through the window as the timer ticked down. It was at 15 seconds. He closed his eyes and fought back the urge to panic. He felt he was killing his own son—sacrificing him to save the universe.

  He peeked as the timer passed 2 seconds.

  ***

  Kyle froze. Priti froze as well. Everything appeared to be moving in slow motion. Not just from the situation, he noticed, but literally in slow motion. One of the raptors was in the process of opening its mouth to scream at Kyle, but no sound was coming out. Kyle stared at it in fascination.

  Then he heard music. Not the perfect harmony of the violins, but a low, frightening cello sound and it was coming from the distortion field!

  Kyle seized the opportunity and scooped up Priti in his arms. She felt like she weighed a hundred pounds. Priti didn’t even react. She could have been a robot or a giant stuffed toy filled with rocks.

  Kyle ran toward the distortion field where he could see the slightest shimmering of greenish blue appearing. It was spinning ever so slowly. One of the raptors moved its head and began to open its mouth, but Kyle was moving in real time while, for reasons he couldn’t understand, everything else was moving much slower.

  Kyle dove into the distortion field with Priti in his arms and squeezed. Then he blacked out.

  ***

  When he came to, Priti was licking his face with her disgustingly long, black and very wet tongue. Had he made it? He jumped up sending Priti sprawling.

  I’m in the capsule! Are we back in the future?

  He looked through the green gel; it was dark outside. Maybe there’s no one in the lab?

  Then he saw a light. A single focused point of light moving back and forth until it finally shone into the capsule and on him—then on Priti. Priti moved closer to Kyle.

  “Well, come on Priti. Let’s meet the welcoming committee. Boy, are they going to be surprised to see you!”

  Kyle felt around for the opening. The gel parted and he stepped out. He looked up and was astonished to see a full moon shining down on him. Several black clouds passed in front and cast shadows across the ground. The moonlight illuminated the trees and bushes nearby. He wasn’t in the lab!

  A figure approached with a flashlight and shinned a light in his face. “Kyle? Is it really you? And Priti? My goodness!”

  Kyle looked at the figure in front of him as the light from the moon illuminated her face. He recognized her!

  “Mom? Is that really you?”

  The older woman with wrinkled skin and gray hair reached out and hugged him tightly. Priti simply bobbed up and down nearby and cocked her head to one side.

  “Mom, where am I? What happened to the lab? Why are you so…old?” he said looking at her.

  “Kyle. I’m not Mom. It’s me…Teresa.

  Chapter Twenty- Seven

  A lone man entered the clear Plexiglas elevator and nervously fidgeted. The door closed with a thud and the elevator shot to the top some forty feet above. Another door opened behind him. He tried to control his breathing and relax—after all—he was a drifter! The drifters were an elite force of specially trained dinosaur handlers. And all of them were expert marksmen.

  The man stepped out onto the platform and held onto the rails. He pressed the button to extend the platform. As it moved steadily forward, a sudden strong jolt caused him to fall sharply to one side and then the other. He grabbed the rail even tighter. It wasn’t entirely unexpected.

  He straightened himself out and pressed the button again. The animal calmed down as the Ground Task Force operator (GTF) directed the full-strength laser beam at the animal’s head. The distortion wave acted like a tranquilizer causing the animal to think and move in slow motion. In so doing, it made the animal controllable. The beam vibrated the strings deep within the sub-atomic structure of the cells of its feeble brain and distorted the natural harmony of the fabric of creation.

  Feeling more confident, the man attached a line to a harness on his back. The GTF crew below controlled a pulley system located somewhere up in the ceiling of the building and they were prepared to yank him out if necessary.

  The giant dinosaur opened and closed its jaws and snapped its teeth shut several times indicating its displeasure. Its head was enormous compared to its body—and its body was gigantic. Some of its teeth were nearly a foot long—fifty of them all together—and they dripped with yellowish-green saliva. The pressure the animal could exert with his jaws could snap a car in two with one bite.

  Dark green scales a half inch thick protected the animal’s hide and were nearly impenetrable. Its deep golden eyes with a black slit in the center darted back and forth looking for a way to break free from the force controlling its mind. It wanted to be free.

  The drifter reached out and grabbed the back of the seat positioned on the animal’s back and waited to see if it remained still. The animal didn’t move. He jumped into the seat and immediately snapped the shoulder harness in place and then reached across and brought the seat belt into position with a click.

  From below, a sinister looking man with a cane watched this momentous occasion with rapt interest. The smallest smile crossed his face and the men standing near him marveled at this. He was their leader.

  A light blinked on the console of the disruptor beam. The operator almost missed it since he had been watching the eyes of the Commissioner. He was mesmerized by the glimmer of a smile on his face.

  The operator’s pulse shot up as his heart began to beat faster. This can’t be happening. The Commissioner will have me eaten alive by the babies!

  A flicker in the disruptor beam had an immediate effect on the large dinosaur. It shook its head violently back and forth as if trying to clear something from its non-existent ears. The small flap of skin on either side of its head, called the tympanic membrane, served as the source of sound reception; its ears were internal.

  The drifter, seated on the back and strapped securely to the beast, was thrown back and forth with such force it snapped his neck. He never felt a thing. The pulley system, still attached to the drifter, came crashing onto the platform and the small hint of a smile on the Commissioner’s face turned instantly sour.

  “What did you do?” screamed the Commissioner.

  The operator of the GTF looked dumbfounded. “I…I…didn’t do anything, sir. I don’t know what’s wrong? The system controls indicate everything is operating within acceptable limits.”

  A crash outside the operator’s booth made them all jump. The beast had broken free of its confinement. The test had come to a halt.

  The Commissioner looked at the control panel. There was the slightest shimmering effect visible that only his eyes could detect. In that moment, he knew.

  The boy has returned.

  Chapter Twenty-Eight

  Priti preened her feathers while Teresa sat down next to her and stroked her back. Her brother had finally returned—after a long, hard life waiting and knowing that she might have to live it all over again. Would she remember, she wondered?

  Can I know what I know and be 12 again?

  It was a day she knew would come.

  Fifty-two years! Was this what happened when we went back the last time? Could it have been this hard on my parents?

  She truly hoped she wouldn’t remember—ever.

  “How long ago did they…die?” gulped Kyle still trying hard to comprehend what he was now seeing. His sister—64 years old. His mind was having a very hard time trying to adjust. Teresa said it would be okay again. How can she know that? What if it isn’t?

  “Mom died ten years ago. Dad…well, it’s hard to talk about him. Maybe sometime soon. It’s just so hard…what happened, I mean.”

  “What did happen, Teresa? Where is the lab? Why did time move forward so quickly while I didn’t experience but a day?”

  “I don’t have all the answers, Kyle. Dad always felt you would be the one to finally figure it all out. He said you were the tr
ue genius in the family.”

  “Excuse me? Do I even have the right planet? That doesn’t sound like my father.”

  “He knew he should have been a better father to you and he carried the weight of the paradox on his shoulders. It changed him. But he said it could have been worse—much worse than it actually was.”

  “What’s this paradox you keep talking about? I know I should know what that means…”

  “Basically, it means the opposite of something. In the case of time travel, it means the opposite of life…at least as we know it. Oh Kyle, it’s all soooo complicated. Dad…tried to stop you from coming back.”

  “Stop me? Why? I thought you just said…”

  “I know. That’s what I mean when I said it was complicated. Dad was afraid that if you brought Priti back, you would throw off the harmony of the entire universe. If that happened, he thought it would mean the end of time. He was partially right. He thinks you may have entered the time capsule at the precise moment he removed the shoestring…”

  “The shoestring! Oh no! I forgot…”

  “It’s not there.”

  “Huh? The shoestring isn’t there?” asked Kyle as he walked back over to the capsule. He looked down and realized Teresa was right. The shoestring was missing.

  Priti sniffed the air and started bobbing her head up and down and squealing.

  “Now what?” asked Kyle. Someone else was approaching.

  A beautiful Indian woman in traditional sari dress, very bright orange and yellow stripes across the delicate fabric, walked over to them. The woman’s hair was exceedingly long and black with streaks of gray.