Bow Ties and Chickens

Thomas

The newspaper came on Wednesday, as it usually did. 

Thomas ran down to the bottom of his driveway to retrieve it for his dad, but on the sprint back up he noticed the headline was in color, something that wasn't all that common in the newspaper his father ordered. 

'LIVE TYRANNOSAURUS REX CREATED FROM CHICKEN DNA AT LOCAL MUSEUM,' it read, with a bright and colorful picture of a greenish lizard-like creature in a large greenhouse out behind the museum. 

"DAAAAAAAAAAD!" Thomas screamed, running up to his father and waving the paper over his head. "Dad they have an awesome new exhibit at the museum can we go see it PLEEEEEEAAAAAAAAAASE??" 

"It's about dinosaurs, isn't it?" his father asked dryly. "Another skeleton discovered? I guess we can go see it next Friday-"

"NO," Thomas said. "They have an actual, live T.rex now!!" 

"What?" his father sat straight up, grabbing the newspaper from his son's hands. He read the title, his eyes growing wider as he read the little words Thomas never bothered with. After a few minutes of sitting still, which was very hard for young Thomas, his father finally finished. 

"We will go to the museum after lunch," he decided, setting the paper down and going inside. Thomas eagerly followed him, and as promised, after lunch, they hopped in the car to go see the new exhibit. 

When they arrived the museum was strangely quiet, as if no one had read the paper yet. Thomas doubted that was true. 

His father bought tickets, and they went inside. They passed some people rehearsing a play as they passed the indoor gardens, the museum's pride and joy, but other than that the place was about as busy as it was normally. Plenty of other people walked around through the natural history and art exhibits, but no one actually seemed at all interested in the new dinosaur out back. Or maybe they had seen it already. 

Finally they came to two large double doors with a yellow sign next to them that said 'WARNING: DINOSAUR CROSSING'. Thomas knew that this was the start of the dinosaur exhibits with the old bones and things, and that beyond that small door at the back lay the newest addition. Thomas could barely contain his enthusiasm as he half-ran, half-walked through the winding pathways of bones. 

They pushed through the doors into the large greenhouse from the picture in the paper, with thick glass tube walkways weaving their way around what looked like a prehistoric jungle. 

Thomas looked around wildly, but saw no sign of the Cretaceous monster. He saw a few other families glancing around hopefully as well, but still no sign of greenish scales. 

Suddenly there was a scream of delighted terror and an avalanche of people to the source of the sound. 

A large nose was sniffing the glass carefully, and that nose was connected to a head, which was in turn connected to a body, which then thinned out into a powerful tail. 

The tyrannosaur's eyes were a penetrating amber, and its scales were stunning emerald and mud stone. It even had some small feathers on it's body that were a dull grayish color. 

It swiveled it's head around to look at Thomas, and he froze and let it do so. For a moment it didn't look dangerous, or even thrilling, but beautiful, peaceful, and serene. Emotions rushed through the eight-year-old. 

Then it reared back it's head and roared, causing the ground itself to shake. The delighted screaming once again echoed through the tubes. 

Then the huge creature disappeared into the trees, and Thomas was convinced.