fossil of the weekend! #40

a fossil salamander from china, that i can't remember the identity of (darn my peanut sized brain!)... any palaeo experts out there who have a suspicion as to its ID could you please let me know...

the anomalocaridid gallery is here!

head over to ART Evolved and check out the new Burgess Shale themed gallery!!!

my cousin of the week #17

a new zealand bell bird or Anthornis melanura. it also known by its maori name Korimako.

fossil of the weekend! #39

an anomalocaris claw on display at the royal tyrrell museum. in anticipation of the ART Evolved gallery coming out this week! be sure to check it out...

my first (and maybe last) debriefing...

this was turning out to be the biggest day of my life... at least as far as weird things happening to me all at once was concerned! which is saying something, as they seem to happen to me all the time!!!

i'd solved a major fossil poaching case, been captured by the poachers, witnessed not one but two major battles for stolen fossil eggs, in the end been rescued by my former roommate, and learned that not only he but also my legal guardian are both members of a top secret scientific organization!

as if that list weren't big enough, now i had the head honcho of said secret organization, palaeo-central, wanting to speak with me. this was, of course, the very intense professor paradigm. a man who last time i'd seen had promised for something terrible to happen to me if he caught me meddling in this poaching affair... so i wasn't exactly excited about the talk we were about to have.

i nearly jumped out of my skin when he asked me his first question. i was expecting him to scream at me. instead he calmly asked "you weren't harmed were you?" he seemed to ask it out of concern and almost sympathy (not something i'd expect from paradigm).

"no," i answered in a half lie. though my wrists were rope burned and i had a big bump on the back of my skull from the kick, but overall i'd been worse.

"good," paradigm actually sounded genuinely happy to hear. which was odd, i'd always gotten the impression he didn't like me. "now tell me traumador," he prompted. oh great i thought, here it comes! "how did you figure out this was where the poachers were digging?"

i was confused as he didn't sound mad or anything... that and as it was an opening to show off how clever i'd been (i so rarely pull off clever things due to the small brain and all) i proudly explained how i'd collected micro fossils from around all the poached quarrys, had gotten help studying them, and of my big geology break through in the museum's collections...

after i concluded my tale there was an awkward silence. i was ready for paradigm to explode at hearing the depth of my meddling. instead he finally just answered. "impressive," if i didn't know any better i'd guess he was, well, impressed.

the silence returned, and this time it wasn't going to end unless one of us started a new tangent. i figured i was safe from him getting mad now, as paradigm had had plenty of opportunity to yell at me by this point.

"what is palaeo-central exactly?" i asked... which was probably a little bold on my part, but hey what did i have to lose at this point?

paradigm shifted slightly, as though to assess whether i was worth of the answer or not. apparently i made the cut as he instructed. "walk with me."

paradigm started hiking away from the poaching site and back towards the highway, and as he'd asked me too follow i walked along side him. "before i tell you any of this, you must swear to complete secrecy everything i tell you."

"sure," i promised, though its not like palaeo-central is the best kept secret out there...

"we are everything, and yet nothing, that the rumours claim us to be," paradigm explained... or at least i think he was explaining? everything and nothing, he was losing me with the first sentence. oh well, at least it wasn't the first time this had ever happened to me.

paradigm seemed to pick up my confusion, yet he hadn't looked at me, he just seemed to know what he'd said went over my head. it was weirdly familiar somehow.

he started over talking at my level. "palaeo-central in a nutshell is the protective agency watching over all aspects of the science of palaeontology. this mostly centres around fossils," he paused to ensure i was keeping up. "this includes who can and should be collecting fossils, what are they being used for, and most important ensuring they are being used to increase and better humanities collective knowledge of the past." okay this i'd already heard. "our mandate extends beyond fossils though. we deal with the human side of fossils too, including scientists and researchers, traders, collectors, companies, religious groups, and even governments on occasion."

"so you guys are like the james bonds of science?" i asked, as i pictured paradigm pulling out rocket packs for us to ride back to the museum.

paradigm made a strange noise through his re-breather. had it not be so short i would have thought it was a chuckle, but if it was it lasted less then a second. "well, that is what our enemies are meant to think. despite our reputation, palaeo-central is not all seeing, or comprised of an army."

this was a bit of a surprise. after all the hoopla everyone had been making about palaeo-central i had envisioned it as being a huge operation like in the movies. "no, we are rather a loosely organized network of specialists and operatives scattered throughout the world's palaeontologic institutions, who while working a normal job in the field, carry out the secret mandate of safe guarding fossils from the 'dangers' of the greater world."

"huh?" i dumbly said out loud. it wasn't that i complete didn't understand the professor. what did he mean by specialists and operatives?

paradigm once again seemed to know what had confused me, which was getting eerie, and he clarified. "palaeo-central agents aren't really secret agents like james bond, traumador. i recruit people who are already in key positions in the palaeontologic community. scientists, students, technicians, administrators, collections managers, even tour guides!"

tour guides... that explained dan and craig. dan was a physicist, but had been tour guiding at the tyrrell on the side for years. craig, well he'd always been a tour guide until he'd suddenly taken off to new zealand (though he'd been acting weird just before i was fired from the tyrrell 3 years ago).

"why go to all that trouble?" i asked. "i mean, if fossils are in that much trouble, why not just organize the whole science against the 'threats' it faces."

"i always wondered the same thing when i started as a scientist," paradigm reflected. "sadly academics and scientists aren't the easiest to unify on anything. that alone on enemies that might or might effect them individually. getting the whole science to coordinate a united defense across the different personalities, ideals, politics, and countries we all are divided by is all but impossible. believe me i tried."

"so palaeo-central was the solution," i guessed.

"preciously!" paradigm seemed to approve of my keeping up. "for well over a year i campaigned the worldwide central authority of palaeontology, the international palaeontological committee, to recognize the potential threats facing the science. i fell on deaf ears until 1970, when several high scale incidents struck just as i'd predicted. as of that year my proposal finally had received approval, and i was put in charge of a special task force under the supervision and control of the committee to spearhead a defensive effort. you know it today as palaeo-central."

"wow," i said out loud to a key realization i'd had listening to that. it wasn't about palaeo-central or how it was a branch of palaeontology's focal organization (everyone in the science world knows the international palaeontological committee), but rather paradigm's age! if i followed him correctly, 1970 was an early point in his career... i'm no expert at maths, but paradigm sure looks good for a man his age!

then something suddenly occurred to me in my tiny brain... "hold up, what did megan sauer and jo harvager have to do with the pack of the primordial feather?" i thought out loud.

paradigm stopped dead in his tracks and looked at my intensely. "what are you babbling about?"

i quickly explained how i'd gotten involved in the poaching case as i thought it was what the pack had been up to around the tyrrell. paradigm was baffled by this connection, but not by the pack being up to something fishy. before he could elaborate on his knowledge, my big day got a whole lot bigger!

the thing is had i checked my email earlier that day i'd have known better then to go outside!...

for i'd gotten a dire warning from my mysterious contact in the pack, ruffled feather, who had tried to alert me to the about to unfold situation.

Traumador,

You are in serious danger! Get out of Drumheller now!

We underestimated how important the crate is to the Pack. They've responded to your escaping the Crimson Talons by bringing in an even more dangerous player. Jaden Spectre

Pull out of Drumheller to where ever. We'll regroup and reconsider our actions against the pack later, but you have to get out now! Your life depends on it!!!

Ruffled Feather

i really wish i'd gotten this email...

for just as paradigm was about to reveal what he knew about the pack's drumheller activities, i could have sworn i smelt another human nearby (stupid wind direction!)... if only my hearing was as ubber keen as my sense of smell. i'd have heard the man who was literally stalking me and the professor.

just as i was about to state my concern over the smell, i suddenly was seized from behind by my chest. at the same moment the professor suddenly found himself being punched in the head. despite the complete surprise, paradigm instinctively dodged part of the blow...

this however threw him slightly off balance and our attacker seized the opportunity and slammed his elbow into paradigm's exposed back. before i could struggle i was suddenly overwhelmed by a painful hold applied to a pressure point on my abdomen i didn't even know i had... it really hurt! i couldn't move from my tummy up...

"it's been a while alvar," our assailant addressed paradigm by his first name.

"spectre!?!" the professor loudly proclaimed in surprised response. "what in extinction's name..."

"i've just come to study this specimen," this spectre guy replied, holding me up painfully by my throat. "i hope you don't mind too much that i borrow him from you."

to be continued...

my cousin of the week #17

a spur-winged plover in dunedin. they are also known as masked lapwings.

fossil of the weekend! #38

a cast skeleton of antarctica's most famous dinosaur (but definately not its only!) cryolophosaurus. mounted at the auckland war memorial museum in auckland NZ.

my cousin of the week #16

two of my favourite birds, in the best photo i've ever taken of them! two new zealand kingfishers, aka todiramphus sanctus or in maori kōtare.

a even better H-day present?

suddenly like that, things were all good again. i'd be rescued from the poachers, by none other than my former roommate dan, of all people!?!

not only was this a shock to me, as i'd thought i'd said goodbye to him for the final time, but now it was turning out that he was not who i thought he was. dan it was out was a member of palaeo-central...

don't get me wrong. i was pleased about all of this initially. dan after all had been the one who'd saved me. more to the point was the one to untie me as well.

"there we go," dan said as he undid the last knot.

"thanks!" i enthusiastically thanked him, as i stretched my arms... do you know how much it hurts to have those tied up for a few hours?!?

"no worries," dan replied. "could we consider it your hatching day present?"

"my what?" i asked in disbelief. it couldn't be my hatching day again already could it? though as i thought about i was shocked to realize he was right! today was my 6th hatching day! man it feels like i hardly got anything done this year (:P)...
`
"i guess wishing you a happy hatching day, after all this, would be kind of pointless wouldn't it?" dan sympathized with me.

it certainly had been a weird hatching day... i didn't even want to know what present might be coming my way this year... considering everything that had happened as a result of my last one!!!

there was a silence at that thought, as both of us had nothing to say. dan trying to segue the conversation asked. "so how's the rest of your trip been since i last saw you?"

how has my trip been?... how has my trip been!?! after everything i've been through today, and more to the point all the things dan has been keeping from me... that was the best dan could come up with!!!

"you lied to me! " i accused dan madly... which i guess was a little ungrateful as he'd just saved me, but i was really angry at him now. "i thought you moved away!"

"i did," dan stated matter of fact, unable to believe i'd accused him of that. "you saw all my stuff in the truck, and me drive off... oh and not to mention crushing richardo!" oh yeah, i did do that didn't i...

okay i wasn't really mad at him for that... though his being here did raise the question if he'd moved away why was he back... however i was pretty sure it was part of my next question. "why didn't you ever tell me you were in palaeo-central?"

my question didn't phase dan one bit. "it wouldn't have been a secret then," he replied matter of factly. "not much point to being an undercover operative, if everyone knows your an operative. especially those closest to you."

i got it... no i seriously got it, it made total sense. still it really hurt to hear. if i was capable of crying i'd have been pouring like a river right at that moment. sure me and dan had never exactly gotten along, but that can be said for me and most other humans/dinosaurs (when you have a brain as small as mine it can be hard to not mess up with everyone). yet he and my legal guardian craig were the closest thing i had to a family... isn't family supposed to be honest with you?

then a more to the point occurred to me, which might explain. "how long have you been an 'operative'? i inquired thinking i'd figured out why he hadn't told me. dan must have started with paradigm just recently, and thus it was a new thing. there was no big secret, just a short one...

his answer shattered my hope. "5 years," dan answered finally with a bit of guilt. despite how we often were confrontational, dan still had always looked out for me (or so i thought anyways). he could see i was really upset learning all this. "i joined a couple months after craig..." dan suddenly trailed off realizing what he'd just told me.

WHAT?!? i nearly fell over from the shock of this revelation... my legal guardian was part of palaeo-central, and he'd never even so much as hinted at it once in the time he'd taken care of me. hmmm, okay apart from the last time i saw him 2 years ago! he had threatened larry in reference to central, but i hadn't realized what it was at the time...

the two people i trusted the most in the whole wide world, and they'd been lying to me nearly my whole life!

dan knew just how hurt i was. "traum, i'm sorry we never told you," he began. "it was just..."

"it was just what. that you actually did hate me?!?" i screamed, which with my tyrannosaurian voice box came out more like a scary roar. i'd always knew i annoyed dan, but up till now i'd always thought we were still close.

dan came in close and put his hand on my back. "no, traum," he calmly assured me. "quite the opposite. craig insisted we never tell you, to try and shelter you from all the evils centrals fights against everyday. it is a scary world for you fossils. we didn't want your life to be dominated or limited by them."

it may not have been much of an explanation, but it certainly was helping me to feel better. he could have been lying, but i knew dan, and despite my small brain i trusted my memories of my childhood. him and craig had always tried to do what was best for me. whether i knew it at the time or not (i could make it very difficult on them if i didn't see it their way).

"in fact," dan concluded. "it was because of you that craig joined. he wanted so much to keep you safe from all the dangers out there."

"really?" i asked very moved.

"yes really, you pea brain!" dan retorted. "even i have to admit you were quite cute as a hatchling, won't want anything to happen to you then," he fondly recalled, but quickly added. "not that you stayed that way for long, mind you."

i was suddenly feeling a sort of sad happiness. sad because it was about times long gone, my childhood was gone and it was never coming back, but yet happy because suddenly my two human roommate's sacrifice on my behalf had been revealed to me. i DID have a family who cared about me!!!

i started to thank dan. "thank you so much for trying to protect me. i can't believe you guys signed on for all that, just for me."

"woah! woah!" dan cut me off, and then corrected me. "i said craig joined because of you. i signed on just because craig asked me too."

i slumped a bit again, so dan didn't really like me, but in response to this he cracked a big smile. "alright," he admitted. "i did do it a bit because of you. only a bit, though."

"you've always annoyed me traum," dan said scornfully, but then suddenly he grabbed me up into a big hug. "but it's only because you're family... really, really, really annoying family, but family none the same."

i had never been so happy to be hugged before (which are actually kind of painful for us theropods with our not straight up and down backbones...).

suddenly from behind us came the booming voice of professor paradigm, who'd clearly recovered from being knocked out. he was looking away from our embrace as he stated. "i hate to interrupt this touching moment, but this is hardly the time or the place gentlemen."

"yes professor," dan said over my shoulder.

"you mean palaeo-prime don't you?" paradigm sharply corrected.

"sorry sir," dan apologized.

"i would prefer not to leave both suspects alone with agent montgomery, so if you could please assist her, dan," paradigm insisted.

"i guess that's my cue," dan said with some conclusion. "i guess i'll see you around sometime, traum," as he let go and started to walk off in the direction of amanda and the two poachers.

"you're not coming back?" i asked in disbelief.

"i moved remember?" dan replied in irritation.

"i just meant after dropping them off in jail," i responded feeling dumb.

"ah right," dan said in his usual way, remembering my brain deficit. "we aren't going to be processing them 'locally'. i'm going to have to escort the two of them a little ways away," i was about to ask where that was, when dan reminded me. "top secret, remember. i can't tell, so don't ask."

i dumbly replied with the only thing that came to mind "bye!"

"now that you're in the 'know', i'm sure we'll be seeing you again traum. don't you worry," dan assured me as he walked off. he suddenly stopped. "oh and when you see him, tell craig i said hi," dan resumed walking, but stopped suddenly as a thought occurred to him. he turned with a intense seriousness. "and if you tell anyone i hugged you, we're not cool anymore. you understand me?"

i nodded, and with that dan gave me a salute off his head as farewell and walked off through the badlands back to the car.

holy smokes what a H-day! everything i thought i knew about those who raised me turns out to be wrong!

wait, did dan just say when i saw craig? i haven't seen him in a couple years... when was that suddenly going to change?

then it occurred to me where i was standing. in the middle of the badlands, poaching remnants all around me. what was i supposed to do now, i thought. i hadn't been at all that many foiled fossil poachings before. what was i supposed to do now?

as though to answer my question a big strong hand settled on my neck. "i hope you're not planning on running off," professor paradigm boomed. "we need to talk!"

right. the professor. oops. i found myself gulping in panic. he'd warned me he'd give me quite the thrashing if he found me still investigating the poachings... and here i was, not only at the crime scene, but captured by the very criminals he'd been worried about getting me.

yeah this was turning out to be one "great" 6th hatching day!

next an old "friend" of paradigm's!

fossil of the weekend! #37

the amazing cast skeleton of the giant sauropod barosaurus at the american museum of natural history in new york. (photo courtesy of my talent agent peter bond and lillian the albertosaur)