The Last Time Jack
Lightning Pranked His Cousin
Begonia tilted her
head a little and studied her cousin through narrowed eyes. “You’re lying,” she
said, crossing her arms across her chest.
“No joke,” Jack
Lightning took a step back and let his gaze drop just a smidge. “That chair down
there is a portal to dinosaur times!”
“No, it’s not,”
Begonia said. “Mom says it’s an anchor for the water pump.”
“Come on, Begonia.
Of course Aunt Sharon would say that. ‘Cause…” Jack paused just for a moment.
Timing was key. “You know…”
“What?”
“Nothing,” Jack
shrugged and pretended to be really interested in the plaster weave of the cast
on his right arm. “Never mind.” He turned to rejoin his friends who were
waiting in the boathouse.
“What?” Begonia
said as sternly as she could, which wasn’t very stern.
But Jack just kept
climbing the stairs to the boathouse porch.
Begonia stamped
her foot on the dock. “TELL ME!”
“Okay, Okay!” Jack
leaned over the railing. “I wasn’t supposed to tell you this, but Aunt Sharon
didn’t want you to know because she thought you’d be scared.”
Begonia puffed out
her chest to stand at her full height of four feet and six inches. That was
only half a foot away from five feet after all. “I’m not scared.”
Jack regarded his
little cousin evenly and gave her a satisfied nod. “Okay. We were gonna go
check it out. Wanna come?”
The tension on
Begonia’s face broke into a grin huge enough to clearly see the gap left by a
missing tooth. “Really?” she asked.
“Sure,” Jack
shrugged. “I just gotta let the guys know. Go put on a swimsuit.”
“Okay,” Begonia
skipped to the stairs and ran up them as fast as she could. Jack figured that
she couldn’t have skipped up the stairs, but maybe she did. He disappeared into
his room before he could see.
Kenny and Rick
were sitting on Jack’s floor and they jerked to face him when he walked in.
“Did she fall for it?” Kenny asked.
Jack’s eyes
twinkled. “Hook, line, and sinker,” he said.
“Really?” said Rick.
“You do know who
we’re talking about, right?” Jack said, pulling the special rubber sleeve over
his cast. “I found her lying on the couch with cookies on her face ‘cause she
still believes that the cream inside of Oreos works as anesthetic for fallen
eyelashes.”
The boys laughed
and stuffed the rubber lizard masks into the pockets of their swim trunks and
filed back down to the dock to wait for Begonia.
Jack Lightning
watched his little cousin uneasily regard the white plastic lawn chair below
the group. He could sorta see what she meant when she said it looked like a
glowing skeleton chair through the fifteen feet of clear greenish water. It was
the only thing on the pebbly lakebed that didn’t have a solid coating of
brownish green algae.
Begonia took her
face out of the water and looked at Jack out of little kid goggles decorated
with plastic pink fish on the rims. “How do you know it is a time portal?”
“I told you,” Jack
rolled his eyes. “That’s why the water is colder when you swim down deep. The
portal takes all of the warmth out of the water as fuel. They didn’t have
batteries and things back then. The only reason it’s warmer up here is because
it’s sunny.”
Begonia thought
about it for a moment and nodded. “Okay. So we just gotta swim down and touch
it?”
“Together, yeah,”
Kenny said.
“Uh huh,” Rick
said. “And when we swim back up, we’ll have gone back in time.”
“Everybody ready?”
Jack asked. They all nodded. “Okay. One, two, three!”
They all dove and
swam straight down. The first three feet were warm and then the water dropped
like ten degrees colder. The chair got brighter and whiter as the group swam
closer. It almost seemed to glow in the watery sunlight despite the four approaching shadows. Jack felt the pressure in his ears as he swam the last few
strokes.
They all touched
the chair.
Begonia
immediately started kicking for the surface while the boys reached into their
pockets for their lizard masks. Jack may have been imagining it, but the water
felt a little warmer. With the masks firmly in place, Jack, Kenny, and Rick
swam up in a ring to surround Begonia. They broke the surface together and
gladly gulped in a breath of warm air before roaring at her.
Begonia screamed;
the boys laughed. “I hate you, Jack!” she said.
“Ummmm, Jack?” Rick
sounded uneasy.
“What?”
Rick pointed at
the shore. “Where are all of the cottages?”
Jack looked. There
weren’t any. In fact, the shoreline looked completely different. The trees
looked funny somehow. Looking back down at the chair, Jack noticed that it
rested by itself with no water pump amongst rather largish stones unlike the
pebbles he would have expected. A huge spiky clam lazed near it.
“I dunno,” Jack
turned back to his friends and his sniffling little cousin. “Let’s go find
out.”
If anyone had any
objections, nobody said anything, so the boys stuffed the masks back into their
pockets and the four of them swam to the shore. The ground was soft under their
bare feet and ferns scratched at their legs as they walked.
Begonia seemed to
shrink a bit, which said something for a girl wearing a My Little Pony one
piece that was a bit too big for her. “The forest looks different,” she said.
Instead of the
aspen and birch that surrounded the cottages with a scattering of short-needled
pines, they were craning their necks to look up at impossibly tall trees with
giant fan-shaped leaves. They looked like the real life version of a
kindergartener’s drawing of a palm tree. There were pines too, but they looked
funny standing next to ginkgos.
“But,” Kenny’s jaw
hung open. “It can’t-”
“I know,” Jack
said.
The sound of a
roar echoed through the sparse forest.
Mark rounded on
Jack. “But it was a joke. A prank!”
“I know,” Jack
repeated. “Run!”
They broke into a
run just as a huge dinosaur ambled into view from where it had been obscured by
the tall ferns. It was more than ten feet tall and had to be like thirty feet
long with spikes on either side of its front feet that were as long as Jack’s
forearm.
Jack stopped
running at the base of a ginkgo tree. “Okay, guys,” he said, “Start climbing.”
Kenny and Rick immediately scrambled into the lower branches.
“But what about
your cast?” Begonia asked.
“I’ll manage,”
Jack said. Without giving her a chance to protest further, Jack wrapped both
arms around his cousin’s waist and heaved her onto the first branch. “Keep
going. I’ll catch up.” Jack walked a quick circle around the tree before
settling on a branch. It was too thick to grip with only one hand, but it was
the only one he could reach.
The dinosaur was
only fifty feet away.
Jack sighed and
tugged on the fastening for his cast’s rubber sleeve. It dug painfully into his
arm and the skin turned white. He bit his lip and pulled as hard as he could.
He could feel pins and needles in his fingertips, but he ignored them as he
fastened the sleeve.
The dinosaur was
twenty feet away.
Jack jumped as
hard as he could, reached his arms around the branch, and grabbed the rubber
sleeve with his intact left hand. It stretched in his grip, but he held on
tight and swung a leg as hard as he could over the branch. Seated firmly, Jack
released the fastening on the rubber sleeve and let the blood rush back to his
fingers as he rushed to join the others fifteen feet above him.
They all stared
down at the dinosaur below them. It munched lazily on the ferns at the base of
their tree. “I think it’s an Iguanadon,” Rick said, “An herbivore. That’s
good.”
“Everyone okay?”
They all nodded.
“Great. So here’s
the plan.”
Kenny frowned.
“Why should we listen to your plan, Jack? You’re the one who got us here and
I’m two years older.”
“Good question,”
Jack crossed his arms. “What’s your plan then?”
“Ummmm.”
“Exactly,” Jack
said. “Anyway, the plan is we wait until that thing goes away and we’ll go back
to the portal as fast as we can.”
“How do you know
it’s still there?” Rick asked. “Plastic isn’t even invented yet.”
“Nothing’s
invented yet,” Begonia added.
“Well, it was
still there when we were in the lake,” Jack said. “I saw it.”
“Then why don’t
any dinosaurs accidentally come to our time?” Kenny asked, watching the Iguanadon’s
big jaws noisily grinding its salad.
Jack raised an
eyebrow and tried not to stare at a spider the size of his fist that was lazily
descending toward them. “Who do I look like- Google?”
Kenny shrugged.
“Anyway,” Jack
turned to his cousin. “Don’t panic, Begonia, but there’s a spider on your
head.”
Begonia screamed.
It was like someone scared a rusty nail, gave it a microphone, and scraped it
along a chalkboard the size of Kentucky as fast as they could. Begonia’s arms
flailed around in the vicinity of her head so violently that she punched
herself in the eye. Her head slammed back into the ginkgo’s trunk, squashing
the spider flat with a disgusting crunch.
“Ewww,” Kenny
said.
There was a moment
of complete silence before Begonia started to cry, and none of the boys made
fun of her for it. She looked around while she sniffled for something to wipe
her hair clean with, but the ginkgo’s leaves were too small and they had
nothing but their swimsuits and goggles.
“I got it,” Jack
said, holding up his gloved arm. “Turn around a bit.”
Begonia turned to
face the trunk and Jack gripped what was left of the spider’s body with his
fingertips. He dropped it out of the tree and away from them.
Unfortunately, it
landed on the Iguanadon’s head. It flicked its head to rid itself of the spider
and looked up into the tree. It’s head rose and kept on rising as its front
feet lifted off the ground. Standing on its hind legs, the Iguanadon grabbed a
branch just a few feet below Jack and his friends between its paws and pulled
it towards its mouth.
Begonia gasped and
inched as close to the trunk as she could without touching the stain of spider
guts. Her eyes looked like they were going to pop out of her face any second.
“Herbivore,” Rick
said. “Right.”
The entire tree
bent a few inches towards the Iguanadon as it munched on ginkgo leaves. “What
do we do?” Kenny asked.
“I got an idea,” Jack
said. He clambered down to the branch that the Iguanadon was snacking on and
swung his casted arm like a baseball bat. Plaster struck scaly skin and dense
bone with a hollow thud as Jack’s cast smacked the Iguanadon in the face. It
stopped to glance at him for a moment before snorting all over him and
continuing to eat. Jack climbed back up to his friends and started wiping
dinosaur snot off of his chest, glad that his cousin had found something to
giggle at. “Any thoughts, Rick? You’re the one who knows about dinosaurs.”
“Uhhhh,” Rick
thought about it with a disgusted look on his face and tried not to stare at
his slimy friend.
“Hurry up.” Jack
said.
“The masks!” Rick
said. “They look kinda like raptors.”
Jack and Kenny
stared at him blankly.
“Worth a try,”
Rick shrugged and put his mask on.
Jack was glad that
he had wiped his cousin’s head with the outside of his mask. “As Ray Arnold
would say, ‘hold onto your butts!’”
“Really? Jurassic Park?” Rick crossed his arms.
“This is clearly the Cretaceous.”
Once all three of
the boys were ready, they lowered their heads to look at the Iguanadon and made
what they hoped were convincing growling noises. The rubber teeth illustrations
must have worked to scare it because the Iguanadon released the branch and
turned to dash away, but not before Kenny toppled out of the tree and landed on
the dinosaur’s back.
“Whoa!” Kenny
yelped and reached his arms as far around the Iguanadon’s neck as he could.
“Oh crap- it’s got
Kenny!” Rick said.
“Yeah,” Jack said.
“That’s so South Park.”
The Iguanadon had
barely gone twenty feet before bucking Kenny off of its back. He smacked into
another ginkgo tree and disappeared into the ferns. “Is he okay?” Begonia
asked.
“Kenny? You
alright?” Rick called.
No answer.
“One way to find
out.” Jack scanned for dinosaurs. The coast was clear. “Let’s go.”
Once they had all
reached the ground, Jack, Rick, and Begonia picked their way through the brush
to the tree that Kenny had hit. Though the ground was soft enough, rough twigs
snapped and scratched at their bare feet.
Jack found Kenny
first. He was lying at the base of the ginkgo he’d hit. His eyes were closed
and he wasn’t moving. He nudged Rick toward him and turned to Begonia. “Okay,
Begonia,” Jack said. “I’ve got a super important job for you. Are you up for
it?”
Her lower lip
quivered a little and her eyes welled up again, but she nodded.
“Good.” Jack
smiled at her. Not his usual smirk, but the same smile he gave his friends.
“While Rick and I check on Kenny, I want you to walk in circles around us and
watch for dinosaurs. I want you to stay within like ten feet of us and make
sure you can always see my hair.” He indicated his blondish waves. “Do you
think you can do that?”
“I think so,”
Begonia murmured.
“Excellent,” Jack
said and plucked a big pink and purple flower from a nearby bush. He tucked the
stem behind his cousin’s ear and said, “There. That flower is so old that
you’re the only girl to ever wear it.”
Begonia’s lip
stilled and she hugged Jack tight, dino snot and all. She was grinning when she
let go.
Jack nodded at
her. “Alright. Let’s get to it.”
Begonia started
walking in slow circles around the tree and Jack joined Rick and Kenny at its
base. “Your dad’s a doctor. How is he?” Jack asked. There was a little blood
smeared on the ginkgo’s trunk right above where Kenny’s head rested.
“I can’t be sure,”
Rick said. “But he’s definitely breathing and I was able to feel a pulse. I
just can’t wake him up.”
Jack kneeled down
next to his friend and shouted, “KENNY!” Nothing happened.
“Don’t move his
neck at all,” Rick said.
Jack nodded. “Good
point.” He pinched the skin between Kenny’s thumb and index finger as hard as
he could, but Kenny didn’t stir. “We’ll carry him home if we have to.”
Rick stared at
their friend, his face unreadable. “Yeah.”
A high voice
interrupted them. “Something’s coming,” Begonia said.
Jack looked. It
was actually five somethings. They were sprinting towards the group on four
thick, short legs. They were only about half as long as the Iguanadon, but they
had menacing armor plates on their backs and tails. Bullet-shaped heads with
tapered snouts bobbed on short necks more than six feet off the ground as big
feet ending in five heavy, blunt claws crushed the ferns into pulp.
Begonia ran back
to her cousin without even being told. They all huddled at the base of the
ginkgo to let the dinosaurs pass.
“Nodosaurus at a
guess,” Rick said.
“Nerd,” Jack
grinned and punched Rick in the shoulder.
The Nodosaurus
didn’t seem to notice the kids as they thundered past. The last dinosaur in the
group released a fart that sounded like a sputtering broken foghorn as it
passed them. Begonia laughed until the smelly cloud reached her nose.
It was worse than
when the rhino at the zoo farted, and that chased away a crowd of a hundred
people. Jack grabbed his nose and focused on not throwing up. Even with his
nostrils squeezed shut, the air tasted putrid as he did his best to breathe as
little as possible through his mouth. He thought for sure that his nose would
bleed if he let it go.
Something wet and
chunky hit Jack’s leg with projectile force. He looked down and there was Kenny
sitting up and clutching his gut with both hands. “What stinks?” Kenny asked
before heaving the remaining contents of his stomach at Jack’s feet.
Jack wiped his leg
off with a fern and coughed. “Nodosaurus fart.”
“Oh,” Kenny said.
“My head hurts.”
“It would,” Rick
said. “I’m pretty sure you got a concussion.”
Whatever Kenny
said next was drowned out by a ferocious roar that was way too close for
comfort. Bushes crackled under enormous footsteps.
“I think the
Nodosaurus were running from
something,” Jack said.
Rick nodded. “I
think you’re right. Kenny, can you run?”
“Maybe.”
“Good enough for
me,” Jack said.
The noises got
closer and the kids saw their source walk out of the trees on two enormous legs
with three viciously clawed toes. Three more scythe-like talons decorated the
ends of stubby arms. Golden yellow eyes stared forward out of a huge face. Sharp
ridges ran from just above its eyes to its nostrils and another bigger one
started at the top of its head and went all the way to the tip of its tail. Its
lower jaw appeared to be as big as the rest of its head, and its entire gaping
mouth was lined with sharp, peg-shaped teeth that were longer than Jack’s whole
hand.
“I think I know
that one,” Jack said. “T-Rex?”
Rick stared at the
beast without moving. “Nope. Wrong part of the Cretaceous. Acrocanthosaurus.
Bigger than T-Rex.”
“Okay, that’s
nice. What do we do?” Jack’s voice was a little higher than he was used to.
“Well,” Rick said.
“We could hang tight and hope it doesn’t notice us, but I bet we smell new and
tasty.” Sure enough, the Acrocanthosaurus stopped walking and sniffed the air,
looking left and right.
“And plan B?” Jack
whispered.
“It’s not nearly
as fast as a Velociraptor. We couldn’t outrun it in a straight shot, but it
can’t turn as well as we can.”
Jack nodded. “So
zigzag?”
“Probably,” Rick
said and bit his lip.
“Probably?” Kenny
said.
“Best we got.”
“Okay,” Jack took
a deep breath. “Rick, you and I are gonna help Kenny. I’ll take his right
shoulder and you take his left one. Kenny, you run as well as you can, and
we’ll keep you up and moving if you need it. Begonia, You are going to run as
fast as you can and race us back to the portal. What’s the route, Rick?”
Rick studied the
short stretch of forest between them and the edge of the lake. “Let’s run
straight to that cycad and then-”
“That what?”
Begonia asked.
“That plant that
looks like the top of a palm tree.”
Begonia nodded.
“So we’ll run to
that cycad,” Rick continued, “And then we’ll loop around it and head for that
pine over there. We’ll turn again and go to that boulder near the shore and then
go straight to the chair as fast as we can. Once we’re in the water, we’ll be
slower, so let’s aim to get outta here as quick as possible.”
“Everyone got
that?” Jack asked.
The
Acrocanthosaurus roared again. Jack imagined that he could smell the old meat
on its breath. A glob of drool dripped out of its mouth as it spotted them.
“Now! Run!” Jack
yelled and lunged at Kenny. He and Rick helped Kenny on his feet and dashed for
the cycad with Begonia ahead of them and the Acrocanthosaurus uncomfortably
close behind. Kenny was barely holding his weight, let alone sprinting. Jack
could feel hot breath on his back when he reached the cycad.
They turned.
The
Acrocanthosaurus kept on thundering forward a few steps before lumbering to a
halt to turn around.
Begonia had gotten
to the pine tree and was hiding behind it. Jack, Kenny, and Rick were halfway
there. The huge theropod started running again and was gaining fast. The boys
reached the pine tree and the entire group dashed for the boulder.
There was another
roar as a second Acrocanthosaurus jumped out of the trees to land on the first
one’s back. “Great,” Rick wheezed. “They’re fighting over us.”
When they reached
the boulder, the two Acrocanthosaurus were still fighting. Teeth and claws were
going every which way and Begonia clamped her hands over her ears to try to
block out the screaming.
Jack pointed at
their first set of footprints leading out of the water. “Keep going!”
They pulled their
goggles on and ran full tilt into the lake. By the time they found the chair next
to the giant clam again, the Acrocanthosaurus were done fighting. One of them
was lying on the ground with its leg turned away from its body at a disturbing
angle and the other was trotting towards them with blood covering its face.
“Dive!” Jack said.
They all swam
straight down. Even Kenny. From underwater, the Acrocanthosaurus’ footsteps
sounded like thunder in a hurricane. They all grabbed the chair as fast as they
could.
The water got
colder and silent. The clam disappeared and the chair was attached to a water
pump again. The kids kicked off of the pebbly lakebed and made for the surface.
The cottages were back, and Jack’s Aunt Sharon was pacing on the dock with a
phone in one hand and the other gesticulating wildly.
When she saw her
daughter, nephew, and his friends, she dropped the phone. “Where have you been?”
She said. “We were so worried that we called the police! What happened to
Kenny?”
Begonia scrubbed
the last of the spider guts out her hair and handed her mother the prehistoric
flower that her cousin had given her. “You wouldn’t believe it if we told you.”
