NBPL 4

It was late afternoon on the main beach at Cretacia City. With the heat of the day past, most of the sunbathers and swimmers had left the area- but around a firepit in the sand a crowd had gathered. A magenta tyrannosaur with a massive, domed brain sticking out the top of her head was warming herself by the fire. A grill and a drinks table had been set up nearby, a drooling blue jay-patterned archaeopteryx babbling at a giggling blue crocodile with cyborg limbs as they sipped their drinks.

But Marl stood there, nervous, the allosaur’s brain twitching apprehensively under its protective dome. It had been half a year since that cute little brain of hers had been transplanted into her nice new body, and she had settled into her new life well- but she still had trouble talking to people. Six years as a disembodied brain hadn’t been kind to her social skills, and besides, there was still a part of her that was slightly weirded out by talking to dinosaur-people.

“So, how are you enjoying the party?” Spike asked. He wore nothing but swim trunks, yellow and bronze scales glittering in the firelight. Under the glass dome where a normal pachycephalosaur would have a bone one, a giant brain undulated and pulsed. Marl gave a start as she just noticed Spike’s presence- quietly wondering if that brain in the pachy’s head had gotten even bigger since they last met.

"Uh, it’s very nice..." Marl stammered, blushing. The area along the firepit was thoroughly blanketed with beach towels, and a volleyball net had been set up nearby- Teryn the stegosaur laying down next to an armor-plated Dunkleosteus fish-lady. Earlier, they had quite a fun time- Marl hadn’t been much of a good player, but she enjoyed it- until the ball impaled itself on Teryn’s tail spikes.

"Oh! Hello, who might you be?" A purple hadrosaur walked up to her and adjusted a pair of glasses on his duckbill. The entire top and back of his head had been removed, a clear electrode-studded dome surrounding his expanded brain.

"This is Marl. And Marl, this is Jessup." Spike gestured to the hadrosaur.

"It's a pleasure to meet you..." Marl said, as she held out her hand to Jessup.

"Likewise!" One of his dome's electrodes sparked, and his face twitched, but he shook her hand firmly. “Pardon the tics, I’m just calibrating the dome.”

Marl looked at the dome, quietly trying to hide the fact that she’d pay half her salary for a dome like that. “So… what do you do?”

Jessup’s face focused again. “I do some important neurological research, specifically the use of external brain stimulation for improved focus or creativity. Right now I’m zapping my medial prefrontal cortex, the part that governs social behavior. Is it working?”

“Heh, it seems fine to me," Marl replied.

"Good. Aside from the occasional tic, I didn't notice anything different."

Just then, the tyrannosaur walked on by. "I see you two are getting along well... I assume the stimulation's working."

"Oh, yes, actually! I'm more confident and less shy, I DEFINITELY will use the electrodes more in the future," Jessup replied. "Oh, this is Dromea here. She's a coworker of mine. Dromea, this is Marl."

"How do you do, Marl?" Dromea asked. "I haven't seen you here before."

"I'm doing fine, Dromea," Marl replied, nervously. "I've only been here half a year, though..."

"I heard, Teryn told me," the tyrannosaur replied. "You're a handyman, right?"

"Y...yeah, I fix stuff around here. I used to do that sort of thing before my original body got repossessed,” the allosaur replied.

“Ah. So your old body’s back on Earth,” Dromea said. “Man, Earth isn’t all it’s cracked up to be, is it?”

“It’s really not…” Marl sighed. “Wait… are there people here with human bodies?”

“Eh, not really,” the tyrannosaur replied. “It’s not a healthy environment for humans to live in, the bacteria here really don’t like any creature from Earth. And, yes, I know you have a human brain, but it was transplanted in a sterile room to prevent infection.”

Marl frowned, then made a mental note to be extra clean whenever she took off her dome and used her neural stimulator.

“Ahem… so, how did you come here?” Marl asked. “I took the standard route- brain in a vat for a few months.”

Nixie chose that moment to speak. “Love, I feel sorry for you. First class was fun- I got to try out my new body in virtual reality before deciding on this.”

“I chose the standard experience, mostly because I was curious about it,” Jessup replied. “It was certainly bizarre, but actually quite pleasant. It was quiet and peaceful, only broken up by the occasional shift in my thought patterns caused by the brains moving all around me.”

"I liked being a brain!” the archaeopteryx chirped, as Marl gave a start. “Everything was nice and warm and my thoughts were peaceful… and then all of a sudden my thoughts got really really fun!”

“Uh, Edan over there… his brain got dropped as we were putting him in,” Teryn whispered to Marl. 

“How do you know that?”

The stegosaurus winced. “Because I dropped it.”

“Uh, anyway, then I got to see you!” Edan said, turning to Teryn. “You were a really great… uh, brain guy, thanks for that!” 

Dromea giggled as the stegosaurus buried his muzzle into his meaty hands, embarrassed. “At least he likes his… new outlook on life,” the magenta tyrannosaur said. “And after getting some… repairs done to his brain, he’s just as smart as before the accident.”

“Yeah!” Edan replied. “Now I’m smart and happy!” He turned to Teryn. “Did my brain make a funny sound when I got dropped?” He asked, curious. "Did it go squish, or splat?"

“Uh, let’s change the subject…” Teryn replied. “I’m...uh, actually not from Earth, I’m a native.”

“What…? Isn’t everyone here, like, a human? In a hybrid body, right?” Marl asked.

“Well, the colony was founded forty years ago. During the first ten years, the colonists found out that their new bodies shared enough human DNA to be interfertile,” Spike replied. "I'm twenty-seven years old."

“I'm thirty-four…” Dromea spoke. “Born in the fifth year of the colony. Nobody knew what to do with me, or how to treat me. They ran so many damn tests on me, and it took them seven years to realize I was 100% sentient- and nearly two decades to stop giving me weird looks."

"That sounds awful..." Marl replied. "I'm sorry."

"Nah, don't. Aside from liking the taste of raw meat, there's almost no difference between my brain and a human one." Dromea smiled. She tinked her braindome with a claw. “The only real flaw is that our skulls aren’t big enough to hold a smart brain.”

“Heck, I have a hybrid brain too,” Spike chimed in. “And the only pachy instincts I have are to headbutt someone instead of punching them if I get angry.” He sipped his drink. “Or to rub it against someone if I really like them.”

“Heh, our ancestors would be flipping out if they saw us,” Teryn chuckled. Our human ones would be shocked to see us hybridized with some saurs… and our saur ones would be wondering why the carnivores here aren’t devouring the others.”

“Yeah. But isn’t that just what history is? The older generations not understanding what their kids are up to,” Nixie chimed in.

“Well, yeah, if they did I wouldn’t be here,” Marl chuckled, gesturing to her beautiful blue saurian form. “You guys are lucky to have me fixing your stuff!”

“Heh, don’t I know it…” Spike chuckled, gently rubbing his dome on Marl’s cheek. She blushed purple.

"Wait, isn't tomorrow when you two ship out to the edge of the colony?" Teryn asked the two. "You ready yet?"

"Well, yeah, but I've packed," Spike replied. "What about you, Marl?"

"Me too, all I need to do is grab my gear and go," the allosaur responded. "But we'll need to leave in a bit so we can get up early tomorrow."

"Ah, don't worry," the pachy replied. "We can stay a little bit longer..."

The sun came down over the horizon and the stars started to come out. As Marl watched the sunset, she couldn't help but agree with Spike...