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As a child, I went to the museum to gaze up at the bones of dinosaurs, imagining how if I learned the right words to speak, a spell might bring them to life so they could walk the earth again. As I grew up, I turned to books of science as if they were magic tomes. I studied extinct creatures, learning how they mated and bred and raised their young. But after years of research, I had found no way to bring them back, no death-conquering words of power hidden in their D.N.A. So I gave up. I moved on with my life. I took a private industry job, settled down, met a mate of my own, started a family. One weekend, years later, I brought my daughter to the museum. “What’s that?” she asked, pointing at a sauropod skeleton. And so I told her about Diplodocus carnegii, how herds of them stampeded through the lush vegetation of the early Cretaceous, lungs drawing air richer in oxygen than any breath taken since. I told her how it would feel to watch them pass, their massive footfalls rolling through the crust of the planet like thunder, like an earthquake on four legs. She stared up at those bones, her face aglow with wonder. as she listened to my description, I saw the skeleton come to life in her eyes, walking the earth once again. “Do you think they’ll ever live again?” she asked. “Maybe,” I said, smiling. “If you learn the right words to speak.”
Short story written by Peter Chiykowski
website twitter facebook instagramStory prompt taken from a photo by Kafai Liu
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