FSE

Furry search engine

formerly SoFurry search engine

Jim winced as the wheel beneath him fell into a ditch that cut across the mountain trail. The truck was still for a moment, but after a little strain from the engine the wheel forced itself out of the rut and they continued on through the forest.

"You sure it's nearby?" he asked the other man in the cabin, a hiker in the passenger seat. The spot he was looking for wasn't apparent on either of his map screens.

"Yes, it's right up there," the hiker said, pointing up the next rise in the path, where the trees ended and the sky was visible beyond. "On a plateau right at the top of that ridge."

Jim glared at the topographic map displayed on a dashboard-mounted screen; there was no plateau marked within five kilometers of their position. "How did you find this?"

"Well, I somehow got turned around on a trail down in one of the valleys, then I saw an opening in the trees and headed towards it, and when I came out... I was on the plateau. From there I could see where I needed to go, and made my way back to more familiar territory, but... I can't believe nobody's found this before now."

"Neither can I." After maneuvering the truck around a fallen maple tree, he stomped on the accelerator and drove up the steep incline. They emerged from the trees onto a dirt-and-gravel plateau, a short space of bare ground leading up to a crumbling, overgrown stone wall. Other disintegrating and ivy-choked structures were visible beyond this wall, though none of what remained stood more than a foot high, and just past the furthest one the level ground ended and the mountain began sloping upwards again.

Jim let the truck coast a little before coming to a stop, giving the other archaeologists following him enough room to fit their vehicles behind his. He looked around the plateau for a moment, then shut off the ignition and got out of the truck. The extent of the structure surprised him; it may have once been a fortress, made primarily of stone, but what remained standing was badly damaged, perhaps by some long-forgotten battle or a natural disaster.

"Thanks for leading us here," he said to the hiker. "You can leave if you want, but if you feel like waiting and taking a look around with us, too, then I'll be glad to drive you back once we've finished for the day."

"You're welcome, but I think I'll hike back to more familiar territory. It's nice, difficult terrain around here, I have a bottle of water with me, and it's good weather to hike in, too." They shook hands, then the hiker turned away and started to walk back down the slope.

Jim took a deep breath and ran a hand through his thinning brown hair, scanning the forested valleys beneath him. Down there it felt hot and thick, but here, high on the plateau, the air was fresh and cool, stirred by a stiff breeze out of the northwest.

"Man, that wind's refreshing," one of the other archaeologists said. "It's worth it coming up here just for that."

"And the ruins to dig through are just an added bonus, right?" Jim grinned. They stood there a little longer, enjoying the view, then he turned to face the group and said, "all right, we've got work to do. Everyone split up and work through a different section, and give a shout if you find anything. Charlie, could you do an underground scan to give us a better idea of where to look?"

"Sure; I'll let you know as soon as it's done."

"Right." Jim took out a camera and started working with the display on its back. "Just let me set the log shot... Date, eighth July seventeen, location... about twenty-five kilometers southeast of Polson, Montana. Now let's get to work."

Once they had divided up their equipment the six of them went off to separate parts of the fortress, picking through the plants and ivy to examine what was left of the walls beneath and taking pictures of the debris. Jim paused at one of the taller sections of the outer wall and pulled some leaves away from the edge to find it ringed with scorch marks.

"Hey, Bill, come look at this!"

The man walked over, fiddling with a badge on his chest. "What, did you... Oh, scorch marks on the stone; I saw similar patterns over there, too. I guess this place burned down, but when that happened is anyone's guess."

He took a picture, then said, "I'll get Charlie to date the place once he's done with that scan--"

"Jim, over here!"

He looked around to see another member of the team, Traci, waving for him from the center of the ruin. "Look around at the damage some more, see where you can find the worst marks and try to figure out where the fire started from," he said to Bill, then walked over to Traci.

"There's a whole row of metal bars here," she said, pointing to a furrow she had scraped out of the ground with her shovel and the dull rods that poked out of the ground at regular intervals. "It looks from the walls around it that this would be some sort of doorway, but the bars only go halfway across, see?"

"Seismic activity could have shifted the rest deeper, or in a different direction... Or the rest weren't attached to the ground."

"So, what, was this some sort of prison cell? That doesn't make any sense; just look at the size of this room! You could fit a hundred people in here, at least."

"But the bars tell us that this room was meant to be secure, and to hold something either in it or outside it. High-priority storage, maybe?"

"But this room alone takes up nearly a quarter of the area inside the walls. That just doesn't make sense, for use only as storage... Maybe the bars were added later?"

Jim's communicator buzzed. "I'm done the material scan," Charlie said.

"Good. Anything interesting?"

"Yeah, there's a huge organic mass in the middle of what looks like the largest room in the place; I'll bring my extractor out to get that to the surface. There's some metallic samples near that one, but the only other meaningful readings are some metals in the northwest corner."

"How deep?"

"Less than a meter for the stuff in the corner, but the big one starts nearly five meters down and goes deeper from there."

"All right, get your extractor over here, then," Jim said. "Traci, could you get Adam and Kate and help them dig up that other potential artifact?"

"Sure."

It took a few minutes, but finally Charlie managed to weave a large, wheeled machine--his extractor--around the ruined walls and into the room where Jim waited for him. He adjusted some of the settings on the machine, then set a timer, and he and Jim walked a safe distance away so the extractor's pulses wouldn't hurt them.

"Let me tell you, this thing must be huge," Charlie said. "Showed up as soon as I started the scan. We may be looking at more than one fairly large dinosaur fossil."

"Not bad. What about the metal samples here?"

"Oh, nowhere near as big, but at a similar depth."

"Right. Think you can date these ruins, then, and the fossils?"

"The structures will be easy; I'll have my extractor test them as soon as it's done getting out the fossils. As for the dinosaur, we'll have to see, but I should be able to."

They had to wait a little while longer before the extractor stopped running, though they could see the objects it was working on rise up out of the ground even from where they stood. Only--

"Those don't look like fossils to me."

"...bones? Of that size, at that depth?" Charlie shook his head. "That's impossible!"

"What, do you think they were planted there, or that they're fakes?"

"False bones would have shown up differently on the scan, but... Even if they were planted here, they should still be fossils!" The extractor beeped and Charlie ran over immediately to touch the largest bone, which stood taller than he was, with his fingertips. "This doesn't make any sense."

Jim came more slowly, glancing at one of the other artifacts the extractor had pulled out of the ground--a barred door, badly rusted--before moving to the bones. "No it doesn't. But look, it's articulated almost like... Charlie, this is a complete skeleton. That just doesn't happen."

He shook his head again. "Bones, lying all together and in their proper order... It's like it was buried here, but that's absurd."

"Let's at least try to figure out what species it is," Jim said, crouching to examine the smaller parts of the skeleton. "Long head, rounded, definitely a carnivore's teeth. Two horns going back from the crown of the head, then a long neck, shoulders... Shoulders with two sets of joints. See the two sets of limbs here? This set goes up..." He traced the bone with his finger. "This is definitely a wing, and the other limb is a leg. Shoulder joint, elbow, wr--" He gasped. There was another piece of rusted metal circling the last joint on the skeleton's leg.

"There's no way," Charlie whispered. "No way."

"Go get your extractor to tell us if these things are real. Now."

He nodded. "Maybe the sample I found in the scan was deeper, and these just came out because they were closer to the surface... Keep describing the skeleton, so we can at least figure out what someone tried to get us to believe existed at the same time as this structure."

"Right. After the wrist comes a five-clawed foot; one of the claws is set a little apart from the other four, probably for gripping. The spine and ribs come after the shoulders, then we have the hips and one more set of legs, with more metal around these ankles, too. Four claws on the hind legs, and digitigrade, by the looks of it; then there's a long tail to finish it off. Hard to tell when it's curled up like this, but it looks like it's about... ten, fifteen meters long."

"That doesn't match any dinosaur I know of. Must be a new species."

"A new fake species..." Jim frowned.

"Well, yeah, let me just confirm that." There was silence for a little while as Charlie brought his extractor over and worked with the screen, then it dinged, displaying the results.

"Well, what does it say?"

"It... It must be broken. I just bought this last week, but there's no way... No way this is right." He slapped the side of the machine as if he hoped that would change the results. "Jim, it says the skeleton is real, and just fourteen hundred years old. Same age for the metal."

Jim shook his head and stepped over to read the display, but there it was: 918 AD. "There's no way to work something into faking this result?"

"There's no way. This stuff is real."

"So... What is it?"

"No idea," Charlie shrugged. "I've never heard of a dinosaur like this before."

"If we can even call it a dinosaur, considering the apparent age. Four legs, wings, carnivore, very large..." His eyes widened. There was only one creature he knew of matching that description, but...

Then one of the other archaeologists walked over to them. "Hey guys, we just dug up-- Oh, wow, that's awesome. What kind of dinosaur is that?"

"We don't know," Charlie said. "It may not be a dinosaur at all; this skeleton is from the tenth century."

"You're kidding."

He shrugged. "Either it's real, or my extractor's broken already. But I really don't think--"

A car horn sounded from across the plateau, and they all turned to see another truck come to a stop next to their own. The man inside parked the vehicle, turned it off and got out, shaking his head while his gaze passed from the trucks, to the ruins, to the people exploring them. Jim walked in his direction and stared at the newcomer, sizing him up; the man looked both taller and wider than he was, with brown eyes and blonde hair, and after a moment he noticed Jim staring and walked over.

"Who are you?" the man demanded.

He hesitated. "My name's Jim Fuller, and I'm an archaeologist. A hiker led me and the rest of my team to these ruins, and we've been examining them for the past half-hour or so. Why?"

"Because I am the owner of this property," the other man said, frowning. "Didn't you see the ?no trespassing' signs on the trees? I know I made sure to post them."

"I don't recall seeing any. If I had, I never would have brought my crew here, at least not without your permission, Mr..."

"Drake," the man said. "I'm Christopher Drake."

Jim held out a hand before Mr. Drake could continue, hoping the friendly gesture would help to pacify the man. "Nice to meet you, Chris," he said.

Chris shook his hand. "Yes, well, either way you set off my security system. You say a hiker led you here? Where is he now?"

"Off hiking to somewhere else. He seemed to enjoy the challenge of exploring unfamiliar terrain."

Chris' harsh demeanor cracked, and he smiled just a little. "Hikers are like that."

There was silence for a few moments, then Jim spoke again. "You don't seem particularly surprised by these ruins. Did you have any prior knowledge of them?"

"Yes, I knew of them... I just never considered examining them, or having them examined. My family has owned this property for hundreds of years, and we've all been used to just leaving these relics alone. But I suppose since you are working here, I have to ask: have you found anything?"

Jim smiled, relieved that the man did not seem intent on expelling them from his property... yet. He was eager to return to the task at hand. "A few things... I don't really know what to make of them just yet. Some of the other members of the team just dug up something, but they haven't said what. I was about to go see what they'd found when you arrived."

Chris was still for a moment, forehead wrinkling as he thought, but then he said, "all right. Let's go see what you've found."

The two of them were just about to pass the remains of the outer wall when Chris paused, looking towards one of the other archaeologists. "There's a mutant working on your team?"

Jim followed Chris' eyes to where Bill was examining a section of the crumbled outer wall, the silver-and-blue badge standing out against his dark shirt. "Yes, that's Bill, and he's a mutant. Would you like to talk to him? Hey, Bill, come here!" Jim called.

After a moment, Bill turned his attention from the wall and walked over to the two of them. "Yeah, what do you need?"

Chris gestured at the badge Bill wore pinned to his shirt, an engraved silver triangle with a blue 2 in the center. "You're a mutant?"

"Yessir; I thought it would be obvious from the whole required-badge thing." Bill touched the badge with a finger so it reflected the sunlight at them.

Jim frowned and opened his mouth to say something, but Chris spoke first. "Clearly. What's your... ability, then?"

Bill touched his badge again. "That's personal information."

"This is my property," Chris said, crossing his arms over his chest. "And if I don't feel comfortable with a mutant here, then I have every right to send you all away."

Jim glared at Bill, who sighed and said, "I can shoot my fingernails at things, and regenerate them when I do. I only got bumped up to Class Two because the man evaluating me thought I could hurt someone if I took the time to sharpen my fingernails beforehand."

"That's interesting... How good is your aim?"

Bill held out his left hand and squinted, adjusted the angle of his arm, then twitched his index finger, firing the fingernail through the handle of a shovel one of the other archaeologists had left leaning against a nearby break in the outer wall. After pausing a moment to admire the shot, he held out his hand so they could see a new fingernail grow to replace the one he had fired.

Chris smiled again. "All right, that's actually kind of cool. So, Jim, you were going to show me what you've found so far?"

"Right, let's go." He started to walk back into the ruins only to find the rest of the team already walking over to him. Adam was carrying a small wood-and-iron chest, which he set down in the center of the group.

"Here's what we dug up," Adam said. "I was going to open it earlier, but the lock can't be removed with the laser cutter because the position prevents me from setting up the backing and it would damage the wood and whatever is inside. How are we supposed to open this up?"

Kneeling down next to him, Jim examined the lock for a moment, then said, "Bill, do you have your auto-pick?"

Bill took a small device from his pocket and handed it to him. "Here, but the battery's low."

"Thanks." Jim examined the auto-pick for a moment, then touched a couple of buttons on the side and held it up to the lock. There was a short pause, the auto-pick whirred and beeped, and the lock popped open.

After handing the auto-pick back to Bill, he removed the lock, opened the chest and peered inside, and Chris and the five other archaeologists leaned forward expectantly. He put on a pair of cloth gloves, then reached down into the chest and pulled out the only item inside: a leather-bound book with yellowed pages, held closed by a rusted clasp, which he held up briefly for everyone else to see.

"What's it say?" one of the archaeologists asked.

"Give me a minute." Jim stood up and carefully unhooked the clasp, then opened the book to the first page. "I can't tell... The handwriting doesn't look awful, but it's all really faded. I have a restoration kit in my truck, though I can't use it out here."

"What language is it in?"

He squinted. "I think... Old English, or something close to it. Once it's restored enough for it to be legible we'll be able to tell what it says, but until then..." He flipped through the pages, but the rest of them weren't much better--until he stopped on one that was covered with a series of pictures.

"What are those drawings of?" Charlie asked, looking over his shoulder.

He looked over the sketches. "Some sort of creature, from various angles. Four-legged, apparently much larger than a man, if that's supposed to be an indication of scale in the corner--"

"And wings. Jim, this is a drawing of the creature whose skeleton we found."

"You mean they interpreted that fossil into an animal?" Adam asked.

"I wish it was that simple." He passed the book to Charlie. "Date this, please."

"You found fossils?" Chris interrupted, going a little pale.

Jim shook his head. "Not fossils, bones. Right over here, come on..." He led them over to the skeleton, where Charlie was working with his extractor to figure out when the book could have been from. "These bones, the metal samples in this room and the fortress itself all date back to the tenth century."

"The book, too," Charlie said, handing it back to him. "918 AD, just like the rest of them. I think we're going to have to accept that all this is real."

"These bones... of what?" Adam said, leaning forward to examine them more closely.

"That's the problem. Even if they were fossils I wouldn't be able to tell you what dinosaur's description they'd match, but I don't need to be a paleontologist to tell you that dinosaurs and humans weren't alive at the same time. Honestly, I have no clue."

"I have an idea," Jim said. "But it's so absurd I don't even know if I should bother saying it."

"More absurd than a dinosaur living in medieval times?"

"Fair enough. There's no way to be sure, but... I think this is a dragon." Nobody said anything right away, so he continued, "I mean, think about it. It looks like one, these bones are far too recent to possibly be related to dinosaurs, and this book gives evidence that it was alive at the same time this was being written. We've done it. We've found evidence proving the existence of dragons."

Chris shook his head and opened his mouth to speak, but before he could say anything Bill said, "you could be right. If there's no way to fake this, then there's no other explanation. Plus, I once met a mutant who can turn into a dragon; if that's possible, then they must have existed at some point."

"This is incredible!" Charlie said. "To think we're the ones to finally discover something like this... I can't wait to tell everyone."

Jim nodded; he could barely believe what was happening. His team had discovered evidence of one of the most storied creatures on the planet. His! Just to think about the kind of prestige this could bring all of them, and the price they'd get for the bones of one... It was almost overwhelming.

"I wonder if they're still around?" Adam said.

"My family's been living in these mountains for hundreds of years, and we've never seen any," Chris said quickly. "If they still lived here, we'd know. Something so large couldn't possibly hide that well."

"Yeah, you're probably right. Still, it's good to have proof of them, and it's probably for the best that they're not around any more; just think of what they'd be capable of doing to us," Charlie grinned.

"You think they'd stand a chance against today's weapons technology? Maybe an ordinary citizen with a power-limited laser would be in trouble, but the military could destroy them," Bill said.

"I'd rather not find out," Traci shook her head. "I guess it's a good thing they aren't around anymore."

Chris shrugged. "Yeah. Well, I guess I can let you all get back to work, because I've got things to finish down on the farm... But I'll have to know what your plans are for working here."

Jim thought for a moment. "Well, now that we know what we're looking at we're going to have to go over this place a lot more thoroughly to see if there's anything else we can find that can tell us more about dragons. We'll probably come back here for a couple more days to look around, but not much longer than that, I don't think."

"All right," Chris started to back out of the remains of the room. "I'm going to take down your vehicle license codes so my alarms won't go off when you enter and leave my property. Good luck finding other artifacts, and come talk to me when you're done working here."

He nodded and waved. "Thanks, and I will. But please, try not to tell anyone about what we've found here, because I'd rather not be interrupted until we know all that we can about what we've found."

"I won't," Chris said, and walked back towards his truck.

Charlie waited a few moments, then gestured in the direction Chris had left in. "Did any of that seem odd to you?"

"What do you mean?" Jim asked.

"Chris just found out that dragons exist, and that they could have once lived within a few kilometers of his house. But he didn't look particularly surprised, and he didn't look excited, either. That's not normal."

Jim thought for a little while. "I don't know. Some people are good at controlling their emotions like that; I've never been able to tell what my father's feeling by looking at him. He has quite the poker face."

"Or maybe he's just not that interested in dragons," Kate shrugged. "It's the twenty-fourth century, not the tenth, and he's not a knight... They aren't something he has to worry about."

He nodded and looked up at the sky. "Hey, it's starting to get dark. We shouldn't leave all this stuff lying around, so let's get the skeleton down to the storage I rented before we go to bed. But help me label everything first so we can put it back together once we've moved it, and someone take a count of all the bones so we can be sure we don't leave any. Come on, this will be a lot easier while we still have light to see by."