Dinosaur Trouble by Dick King-Smith Page B

Aviatrix.

    Before long she said, “We’re in luck, Nosy. Look down there.”
    Nosy looked down, and on the ground below he saw a simply enormous body, with clouds of flies buzzing upon and around it.
    â€œWhatever is that, Mom?” he asked.
    â€œBrachiosaurus.”
    â€œBut it’s so huge! Whatever could have killed lt?”

    â€œT. rex, I expect.”
    â€œT. rex? That’s what Daddy shouted out in his nightmare. What does it mean, Mom?”
    â€œTyrannosaurus rex,” said his mother. “The fiercest, fastest flesh-eating dinosaur of all. A truly nightmarish creature.”
    â€œWhat does it look like, Mom?” asked Nosy.
    â€œOh, stop your everlasting questions, Nosy, do! Tuck in to these flies,” said Aviatrix.
    She swooped down upon the swarm of insects hovering above the dead brachiosaurus and snapped up the largest. Nosy, copying, began to catch the smallest.
    Then his mother dropped down and landed upon the enormous dinosaur. Nosy followed her. All kinds of delicious little creatures were crawling over the brachiosaurus.
    Nosy said, “But, Mom, what does T. rex look like?”

    â€œWell,” said Aviatrix, with her mouth full, “it’s got a massive body and a short, thick neck, and a large head and a battery of long, sharp teeth. It has tiny forelegs but very big muscular back legs on which it stands upright.”
    â€œOh,” said Nosy. “Mom?”
    â€œWhat now?”
    â€œThere’s one coming.”

3
    A terrifying roar split the air. Aviatrix looked up from her meal of fat flies.
    â€œSo there is,” she said.
    â€œMom,” said Nosy, “hadn’t we better push off before it arrives?”
    Every time T. rex roared, Nosy could see those long, sharp teeth, and they looked very sharp indeed.
    â€œNo hurry,” said Aviatrix. “Time for a bit
of fun. Do you remember what my name means?”
    â€œYes, Mom. Female flier.”
    â€œAnd what else did I tell you?”
    â€œYou said you were paramount among all pterodactyls in the skills of flying.”
    â€œQuite right, Nosy. Watch this,” said Aviatrix, and she took off and flew directly at the approaching tyrannosaurus.
    Seeing her coming, it reared up to its full height and opened wide that huge mouth crammed with sharp teeth. It thought this was going to be an easy meal.
    Now Aviatrix showed just how skilled a flier she was. As she neared that open mouth, she suddenly shot straight up into the air. And, as she zoomed over the head of T. rex, she sank her sharp claws into its snout.
    T. rex let out a loud bellow, not of pain (for its
skin was too thick to be much harmed by a scratch from a pterodactyl) but of rage at the cheek of the creature. It watched in fury as Aviatrix now put on a show of aerobatics.
    First she looped the loop, high above the great flesh-eater, then she dived back down, straight at it, so that the watching Nosy felt sure that his mother’s last moment had come.
    But no, gracefully she sideslipped past the open mouth and then began to sweep around and around T. rex’s neck in tight circles, while it snapped furiously at her. It rocked unsteadily on its hind feet, becoming quite giddy in its vain efforts to catch this pest.
    Shooting skyward once more in the steepest of climbs, Aviatrix hovered for a moment high above the tyrannosaurus. Then, folding her leathery wings, she dropped, twisting and turning like a falling leaf, apparently totally out of control.

    It looked to Nosy as though his mother was going to go straight down the throat of T. rex. But all its last snap at her earned it was a mouthful of fresh air and another scratch on the nose.
    Once more Aviatrix slipped past those gaping jaws and then climbed high, to perform one last magnificent feat of aerobatics. She spread her wings wide and rolled, with first her right wing pointing skyward, then her left, over and over and over, before she finally flew