Shooting Fish in a Barrel

Fade roamed through the halls of the museum, trying to not bump shoulders too many times with the other dinosaurs that had come to see what this “festival” was all about. He was not… incredibly impressed just yet, but it was something. Outside of the occasional winter gatherings, this seemed like the most dinosaurs he had heard of being in one place without bloodshed or violence.

That being said, it was uncomfortably busy inside the different wings of the museum, and there was something uniquely unsettling about seeing skeletons of dinosaurs standing up on display rather than laying down as scattered bones on the earth. He had headed instead down another wing of the museum. It was no less busy here, particularly not with the crowds gathered between the different metal structures (“planes” he had heard someone call them, though he was not sure how anyone knew what they were called). They were all playing games that the festival had set up or watching as someone else made an attempt to win a “prize,” which made navigating around them a bit of a challenge, but at least here there were no skeletons.

Except the horned skull that had been dragged in and placed in another impromptu game stand. There were a few festival-goers tossing large hoops hoping to get it to land perfectly around one of the horns. It felt… a little disrespectful, and made the feathers between his shoulders lift slightly, but few others seemed to have a problem with it.

Least of all Chalcedony, one of the young dinosaurs from the bask he was accompanying. She and the others were the real reason he was here. Chalcedony stared with wide, awed eyes at the games. Fade ushered her away from some of them and others she just was not quite big enough to participate in, but she was determined to try to win something. What was the point of being here if they weren’t going to play at least one game?

Eventually, Fade conceded as they rounded the corner of another exhibit-stand to come across a mostly empty game with little more than a cryo manning the stand and a few dinosaurs waiting in line or watching the player currently attempting to… “win.” The small gathered crowd was rapidly retreating when the pale, freckled utahraptor splashed them with water. Judging by the pool of water at the utah’s feet, this was not the first time he had splashed them.

They also seemed a little apprehensive to see him approaching. Fade didn’t blame them. Scarred, missing an eye, a towering giant among suchomimus - he knew what he looked like. He withheld a tired sigh. He was here for the little ones, he could put up with the crowds. They could play a few games, he could find Inspie and the other young members of the bask they were accompanying around the festival, and then they could go quietly back to the peace and quiet of the shipyard.

Rat plunged his snout into the water and snapped frantically for the apples - which were always somehow just out of reach, even though he was sure that he had it this time. He had aimed right at the apple, how had he missed? Again?

He bit and thrashed his head, splashing so much water out of the trough that there was almost more water outside of it than there was inside. He only jerked his head out of the water when he felt someone tapping his shoulder.

“Hey buddy, you were under there for a while! Are you alright?”

Rat stared dumbly at the cryo carnie, confused why he would be anything but alright. Of course he was, he had just been trying to get the apples - that was the name of the game, wasn’t it? He hadn’t been under there that long, swimming was one of his favourite pastimes and his lung capacity was spectacular, he was almost a fish. Not that the carnie knew that.

His eyes squinted shut in an amused smile, his long whip-like tail wagging behind him as the carnie looked at him with concern. “Yeah of course I am!”

But he didn’t win, though. That was a little disappointing. “I can go again, right?”

“Uh… “ The carnie cryo looked a little uncertain. Rat had already made a few attempts at bobbing for apples and had not managed to grab one yet. They hadn’t really… been trained for this specifically, they had just been asked to man the stand when they volunteered to help out with the festival.

“Can we try?” Chalcedony asked brightly as she and Fade stepped between the airplanes up to the stand. Rat turned to face the newcomers, completely and utterly unfazed to see a giant of a suchomimus approaching. Fade looked just like Rat’s mom - except she was bright gold with black stripes, and a female, and wore a crown. Maybe Fade didn’t look just like her.

The carnie looked a little uncertain up at Fade, particularly when he huffed because he had bumped the top of his muzzle with the decorative string of lights that stretched between the planes, but shook out their feathers. Just put on a polite face and a customer service voice. Everyone was pretty nice tonight, anyway.

“Sure! I think this guy could use a break, anyway, yeah?”

Rat tilted his head, confused. Why did he need a break? He hadn’t won, and he wasn’t even out of breath. He was happy to let someone else try though. He looked at Chalcedony with an expression of enthusiasm and excitement that matched hers almost perfectly as he stepped out of the way.

“C’mon, it’s easy!” Nevermind that he hadn’t won yet.

Chalcedony hopped up on the overturned wooden box that was set in front of the tub of floating, scuffed apples, shuffling her wings and shaking out her feathers in excitement. “Okay!” she chirped, looking up at the cryo. “What do we do?”

Fade grunted in quiet amusement, both at her excitement and that she said “we” as though he was going to join her. He wasn’t particularly keen on shoving his muzzle into a bucket of water and biting for a fruit that dozens of others had tried to catch. The idea of the amount of saliva in this one bucket alone was… unpleasant.

The cryo went right into their spiel, selling the game to them even though they were already here and willing to play. Rat listened intently as well, just in case he had somehow missed something that would make it easier to win.

“The game’s simple - catch an apple from the bucket of water, but you can only use your mouth to grab it. You catch one, you win!”

Oh. That really was it, huh. He just had not yet managed to grab one of the apples. Rat sat back on his haunches, prepared to wait his turn so he could try again, when he would surely manage to snatch one from the water. He caught fish almost every day, and these apples didn’t even swim!

Chalcedony bobbed her head, a determined look on her face. That sounded simple enough, but was probably more difficult than it seemed.

“What does she get if she does win?” Fade rumbled quietly.

The cryo’s feathers lifted slightly, which they hurried to smooth out. “Any one of our fabulous prizes, of course!” They gestured towards a pile of things stacked up near one of the wheels of the plane. Trinkets, odds and ends, that sort of thing. Red meat and fish - “The finest cuts, fresh from the wilds!” the cryo assured them - as well as different fruits and tubers that had been collected before the cold started to really set in.

Fade doubted the freshness of the fish. They didn’t tend to last long out of the water if they weren’t crusted with salt or dried in the sun.

Fade snorted quietly again. He wasn’t sure why they needed to play a game to get some junk or food. He could just poke around the shipyard for some of those things if he needed them for some reason, or go fishing himself. “Fine,” he rumbled quietly, and nodded for Chalcedony to give it her best shot.

Which she did. Enthusiastically.

Chalcedony dunked her head into the bucket, her feathers immediately soaking wet and plastered to her frame as she snapped her jaws at her chosen apple-y victim. She thrashed her head similarly to what Rat had been doing - but to no avail. She came up from the water, panting, and looking thoroughly disgruntled. It was a lot harder than it seemed. The apples were slippery and the awkward, round shape made them difficult to grab, even with sharp teeth.

Fade leaned forwards - the cryo leaned back - and bumped his muzzle gently against Chalcedony’s flank, encouraging her to try again. She huffed and blew water away from her nostrils, took a big breath, and dunked her head back into the water. Rat watched from the side, looking blissfully content and pleased that someone else was playing and having a fun time as well. That was the point of this whole thing! Just a little fun.

When Chalcedony came up for air a second time, she turned to Fade, water dripping from her muzzle. “Can you get one?” she asked, looking up at him with big, pleading eyes.

Fade looked down at her in return, holding her gaze. Her grey feathers were dark where they were soaked to her hide, giving her a bit of a silly appearance which neither helped nor hindered her pleas. “Please please please?” she whispered.

The giant male sighed and closed his eye, accepting of defeat. “Okay,” he rumbled, at the same time that Chalcedony (and Rat, surprisingly and confusingly) exclaimed joyfully.

Chalcedony hopped down from the box and made room for Fade to step up instead. He did not need to stand on the box, and instead just stood over the bucket instead, staring down at the apples as they bobbed merrily around in the disturbed water.

It did look deceptively easy to snag one out of the bucket. A lot of the water had been sloshed out at this point. The apples moved with the water, but not as much as fish unless they were bumped. He had a lot more plucking fish from the water than Chalcedony, and unlike Rat, his teeth curved sharply backwards to make sure that whatever was caught in his jaws wasn’t coming out.

He was also missing an eye, and his depth perception was not perfect. He was just as likely to miss entirely or hit his snout against the bottom of the tub as he was to actually get an apple.

Chalcedony and Rat were still cheering for him, even though he was just staring, standing motionlessly, to the point that the carnie was starting to wonder if he was going to just stand there forever or actually have a go at catching one of the apples.

In the blink of an eye, Fade had darted his head forwards and pulled back, a gleaming red apple held fast in his teeth and water dripping into the tub and onto the floor. Chalcedony and Rat exploded with praise, Rat even jumping to his feet for this stranger he had just met tonight. It was... an oddly nice feeling, even though it had not been that much of a challenge.

Fade turned his snout towards the cryo and let the apple fall from his jaws, where it landed back into the tub with a plunk and a splash.

“Well done!” the cryo praised, knowing full well that they were praising a fishing dinosaur for… fishing. They gestured towards the prize pile. “Feel free to take anything you like!”

“Can I get something too?” Rat asked, looking eager.

Fade snorted quietly as the cryo looked uncertain, only for them to decide that yes, Rat could absolutely get something as well - it would make him move on faster and the cryo could clean up the mess he had made.

Rat darted over to the pile, happily sorting through the junk and snatching a definitely-fresh-fish. Fade encouraged Chalcedony to pick something; she could have his prize. She ran over to join Rat, picking through everything while Fade watched on. Chalcedony returned not long after, carrying what looked like a cartoonishly proportioned blue raptor.

“Don’t you think it looks like Solveig?” Chalcedony asked, holding it up for Fade to see.

The sucho obligingly tilted his head to observe and admire it. It didn’t, really, but he knew Chalcedony missed her sister since she had gone to wander with her father. He rumbled an agreement, which seemed to make her happy as they left the booth to rejoin the crowd.