[Event] 3 of a Kind

Word in town was there was a lunar festival going on and a carnival had rolled in and taken over the local museum. Natural History, Aerospace, none of that old human stuff mattered because now the cluttered spaces of past preservation were now taken over by flashy banners, decorations, games and all sorts of things. Food, drink, for both carnivores and Herbivores, places to relax and watch the fun and places to participate… all lead by the Ringmaster named Cheron. It wasn't that far to get to the museum, so naturally some of the Boneyard dropped by the a visit. 

“Look Piper, Piper look! It's you!” Aeronca would call out as he jumped up and down in front of a little yellow airplane with a black lightning bolt down the side. They were in the aerospace side of the museum because playing some games sounded like fun. The J-3 Cub was was a matching chrome or Piper Yellow just like Piper the dinosaur, she's been named after it obviously. There was another Cub back at the Boneyard, inside and safe from birds. 

“I see this! It's another copy of me. “ Piper was there to watch the two hatchlings, even if she was barely the size of an adolescent Cryolophosaurus. The Piper Cub was sitting at the edge of the Golden Age exhibit, transitioning into the World War II exhibit. Sitting next to the J-3 was an L-4, the wartime counterpart of the Cub. Gone was the yellow paint, now the fabric skin of the plane was olive drab. The yellow cub became the green grasshopper. 

In front of the two of them and kind of between was a big tub full of water and in it were a lot of yellow rubber ducks. The game caught Bellanca’s attention and she was bounding over like the energetic hatchling she was. “Ooh, what's this?!” Piper was quick to try and shuffle Aeronca after her, which wasn't hard since the two hatchlings were attached at the hip already. 

“Hello!” The volunteer dinosaur Manning the duck pond would treat. It was a green banded Oviraptor named Maranta.”This is a duck game! You take your fishing rod and you try to catch a duck with it, the bottom of the duck will have a painted color and that color tells you what prize you won. “ The Oviraptor would explain. He would demonstrate, picking up a “fishing rod” to do so. It was a colorful plastic stick which had a string attached to it, on the end of the string is a magnet. You have to get the magnet to connect to a magnet in a duck’s mouth in order to catch the duck and pull it out of the water. 

“Oh, oh, we should do a bet!” Bellanca would give her equivalent of a grin, trying to go a little extra with Piper and Aeronca. “Best of 3 games gets an extra prize!” she tapped her claws a bit on the concrete and looked to Piper and Aeronca from Maranta. 

“Okay” 

“Sure!” 

Aeronca and Piper would agree. 

With that out of the way the trio would shuffle closer to the duck pond and each of them would take up a fishing pole. This game wasn't too bad for kids, but for dinosaurs with not-human anatomy? Well this was going to be interesting. 

Upon a closer look it seems the pond has a little foot powered propeller at the bottom which spins the water in the tub and the ducks are moving in a circle around and around. Not too fast, but fast enough to be tricky. 

Piper, Aeronca and Bellanca would get at it. They each would try to figure out what level they needed to dip their head to lower the magnet while not being too low. Too low and in the water the magnet went or into the body of the rubber duck. Too high and the magnet bounced off the head of the duck or missed it completely. Then while just about going cross-eyed they would have to try to move to go from duck to duck in the messy rows the ducks have somewhat organized themselves into. This was something that was a little bit easier for the kids who were closer to the ducks than Piper, despite Piper's small size.

It would end up being Piper who magnetized a duck first, fishing it out of the water with a cherry. Following her was Bellanca and then Aeronca came in last when it came to getting a duck out of the water. 

“Alright, alright let's look at those ducks. Set them on the ground in front of you and I will take a look. “ Maranta would instruct. 

Once the trio of players had their poles and ducks on the floor Maranta would go by one by one and take the ducks off the magnets, turning them over to look for the colors before one by one they would put the ducks back in the water. “Let's see, it looks like you- “ Maranta would start with Piper. “Have a green duck!” The Oviraptor shuffled over to grab a green ball from the pile of presents they had. They would bounce the ball over to Piper for Piper to catch. “Here you go! Now... you...” Maranta moved on to Aeronca and would check Aeronca’s duck. “Have a blue duck. “ With that Maranta went to that pile and came back with a foam mallet for Aeronca to wack Piper with, something fun and harmless! 

Lastly Maranta checked Bellanca's duck. “And you have red! The top prize. Maranta would shuffle to the pile and come back with a cute stuffed animal of some sort, giving the Plushie to the hatchling. Bellanca would jump up and down. “I won that one!” 

“You definitely did. “ Piper would agree. 

“What's next?” Aeronca was already starting to wander and the next thing they stumbled upon, not like they had to go too far, was a sort of throwing game. You had to throw a ball and knock down milk bottles. It was simple, would probably be quick! 

“Step right up!” The volunteer Oviraptor named Sosi would encourage them. The brown Oviraptor, marked with bands, would herd the Cryolophosaurus into their own sort of lanes, one to a pile, another to another pile, another to another pile of balls. The whole setup of stacked milk bottles took place on the wings of a Dornier Delphin III. The high-wing flying boat sits on its stomach on the floor, putting it at level for most adult dinosaurs although the smaller Cryolophosaurus were going to have to throw their balls up in an arc. They only got 3 balls each and they had to knock all of the bottles down. 

“Alright, three…two…one...go!” Sosi would wag her wings a bit to green flag them. 

At the command to go the trio would start throwing their balls and it didn't take long before not only were all of the balls sent sailing past the Delphin III, but Piper was the clear winner because she nailed her stack of milk bottles and dropped them all on the ground under the wing. With a happy noise and some tippy taps of her feet she would accept her gift from Sosi. It was a a silly toy snake, one of those big plush ones. She wrapped it around her neck and it was time to move on to the next game. 

“Next next next. “ Bellanca would wander along, attention being grabbed immediately by a sleek, blue airplane with a V-tail. The Bugatti 100P replica. 

Fittingly the game posted up by the raceplane was a racing game! It was a miracle it still worked. Basically, or so the sweet Oviraptor named Buttercup explained, you just had to push the button in front of you a lot, really fast. It was the trio against themselves for now so they all took up buttons corresponding with the fake horses they wanted. Piper got a white horse, Aeronca got a black horse and Bellanca got a bay horse. All of the horses were set on a starting line on the left side of the track they were slotted into. 

“Ready?” Buttercup would ask, looking at them and making sure they were all ready at the same time. 

“Ready.” 

“Ready. 

“Ready!” 

They would all chirp back down the line, fired up and ready to go, leaned in and focused. (They basically had to push the button with their noses). 

“Three… two.. “ Buttercup would start counting due . 

“One…go!” The Oviraptor would raise her wings up as a flag. 

Once the green was given the button mashing started, the mechanical clicking filling the void between the trio of Cryolophosaurus and their Oviraptor volunteer. The mechanical button pushed down a rod that moved a gear and pulled a cable which moved the horse connected forward. 

There was some furious mashing as the three dinosaurs would try to out-do each other in this game of speed and sore noses. By the time the first horse to the finish line set off a bell, they were all three breathing maybe a bit harder in excited anticipation. 

“Congratulations to the winner!” Buttercup would cheer and gather up the prize for…Aeronca! The black horse had hit the finish line first. Buttercup would bring over a giant plush horse and give it to Aeronca who hugged it. 

“Yay I won!” Aeronca would cheer as they would start drifting from the racing game and loitering as they figured out their next plan. “That was three, wasn't it?” 

“Yeah that was three. “ Bellanca would nod before adding on. “So… “ 

“So…” Aeronca would trail off, gears spinning in his head. 

Piper would say what was on everyone's minds. 

“Who won?”