Page 19 of Jurassic Measures
As I sipped my coffee, that was made perfectly, a question struck. “I googled.”
Landry snorted into his own coffee. “Pardon?”
“Dinosaurs, mainly elaphrosaurus.”
“Interesting.” He turned to face me more. “And you have questions.”
“Many but one that I’m really curious about.”
“Hit me with it.”
“Dinosaurs, according to Google, are hatched and you just said your mom was human and now I don’t understand anything.”
He laughed so hard he had to put his coffee on the bedside table.
“Okay, this is going to sound…unreal. And honestly, you’re probably going to grimace. If my father fell in love with a female of his own breed she’d lay the egg, he’d fertilize it. In my case that didn’t happen…kind of.”
“Oh lord.” I braced myself.
“My mother became pregnant and gestated for nine months like a human does. Instead of pushing out a human baby, she birthed an egg…me. My father fertilized the egg after I was free of my mother’s womb, and yes, you’ll argue I was fertilized inside her and you’d also be correct. Then, I hatched.”
“I see…and were you hatched human or…?”
He gently rubbed over my cheek. “Jason, no, I was hatched an elaphrosaurus and shifted, as you say, at three weeks.”
“Wow there’s so much to unwrap.” And there was but this is how it’s been for millions of years.
“There is and it will take time.”
Another question bounced around my head. “How old are you?”
He hummed and narrowed his eyes. “If you googled you likely saw dinosaurs lived anywhere from ten years to one hundred years.”
“Yeah, but if scientists didn’t know you all were shifters then…”
“Full blooded dinosaurs, lived as Google said. Shifters, like myself, a lot longer.”
“Soooooooo?” I motioned with my hand.
“I am currently a little over three hundred years old.”
“Holy…okay and what is your lifespan?”
“About five hundred years but my father is almost that and showing no sign of slowing down.”
Shit…that’s a long time. I was almost afraid to ask but, “Your mom?”
He took my coffee and placed it beside his own. “This is the tricky part and I’ll need you to breathe for me.”
“That sounds ominous.”
“My mother is also still alive. She fell in love and bonded with my father three hundred years ago obviously. When she bonded, truly accepted him, she connected with his life force. When my father does pass, so will she. She is impervious to illness but could die other ways as could I. Gun shot, car accident, you get it.”
“And if she dies?”
“My father dies as well.”
Okay, I was breathing and hearing him which meant… “So I die when you die and vice versa?”
