The Marvelous Adventure of Indie Rex

1. Pro Tip: Don't Let Your Dinosaurs Get Bored...

It's not planned.

It's really not.

I swear.

Stinky gives me too much credit.

I scratch the walls because I'm bored. I'm BORED. Camouflaging myself to jump out at squirrels only does so much when it comes to intellectual stimulation. Good for laughs, though.

Where was I?

Right. So, I scratch the walls because I'm bored and they're stupid. And then I go take a nap, because it's hot and I'm tired. The food-machine rolls in and I ignore it because seriously, I just ate. I'm not an all-consuming maw, CLAIRE. You can't expect me to come out every time you show up with a hunk of meat and some investors, CLAIRE.

Ugh. Now there's humans in here. They're loud, and obnoxious, and one is overweight and one is kinda boring and one—

One smells.

Not just in the BO department. (But seriously. Dude. Take a shower before you come gallivanting through my place.) He smells like something else, though. Something wild, and... familiar.

I get closer, sneaking up on them because this is gonna be fun. Squirrels are nothing in comparison to a couple full-grown men screaming in terror as they run from me.

I was just gonna pop out of the bushes, turn some bright and unnatural color to freak 'em out, maybe snap at a few limbs. But then the fat one's shoulder-talk-box started making annoying noises—a lady is talking and...

Wait.

Is she saying—

They don't know I'm in here?

Oh, wow. This is gonna be GREAT.

I step back, pressing my heel against a tree and feeling it creak and snap. Nothin' like a little suspense to set the mood for imminent death, amiright? Anyway, the humans spin around, and Stinky yells for them to run. And literally, they run directly at me.

And they say I'm  the one that's supposed to be extinct.

Well, at least the fat one realizes where I am and he runs the other way, and, I mean. Good for him.

Boring and Stinky skid to a stop as I stomp out of the trees (their faces! Their FACES! PRICELESS!) then run the other direction.

I haven't had a chase like this in years—since before my sister died, actually. (For the record, I did not kill her. She died on her own, dinner was late, and I had a weak moment. No, I'm not proud, and it would be really great if you would stop bringing it back up, CLAIRE.)

Boring is slower than Stinky and much less fun to chase so I grab him and keep running, but he's making a huge fuss, so I bite him to make him shut up, like I used to do with my sister, but that turns out to be a mistake, because I am actually a heck of a lot bigger than him and I'm pretty sure he's dead now. Oops.

(Humans are gross. Zero stars. Would not recommend.)

Oh. Oh. He's stuck on my teeth. I think I'm gonna puke. Urgh. I shake my head and snap my jaws, trying to get him out of my mouth, and it takes a minute but it works. (Why do I have to have so many teeth?)

By the time my mouth is free, Stinky is too far away to make the chase worthwhile, which—

Oh, my gosh.

The gate is opening.

THE GATE IS OPENING.

FREEDOM!