Prompt: Your Protagonist of this piece is widely considered to be The Great Valley's foremost expert on love, but one day, they are approached by the last dinosaur they ever expected to see, with his/her most challenging request yet
Choices
Prologue
What choice do I make? This is a situation I had never expected let alone prepared for.
I sigh and take a deep breath of the cool air; my father always said it that thinking constructively is best done when you are calm and I have found his wise words to be very true. I look out towards the setting Bright Circle which is painting the sky a beautiful orange-yellow hue. It is as beautiful as the sight below. The Great Valley: from my Thinking Place I can see much of The Great Valley. I can see the long, winding river and endless fields of green grass and trees. These are the most common colours in The Valley, blue and green. It is very different to The Mysterious Beyond where all you can see is bare rock most of the time but I remember the view from Hanging Rock. It was above Secluded Canyon which was basically an empty Valley with a lovely stream running through it that teemed with plenty of fish and the ground had a thin layer of grass and a few trees near the tall ragged cliffs. I close my eyes and remember the last time I saw that sight, the last time. It was with my friends Ducky, Spike and Chomper and my beloved family, it was the first time I had been with them for over a year and two seasons.
Another long sigh escapes my beak as I return to the moment, a brief look down at The Valley and I see each of my friends at their homes. Littlefoot is having dinner with Grandma and Grandpa at the top of a plain hill. I can see Cera tickling her little sister Tricia as she lies down on a small pile of leaves. This sight of tenderness is something that I don't often see from Cera, she and I are usually competitive with each other but she is still my friend. Seeing this sight reminds me that she has a soft side behind that hard head of hers although I won't exactly tell anyone that I've seen her; she'd ram me out of The Great Valley if I ever did that. The thought makes me chuckle but it is no less close to the way Cera would react if I told everyone she was really a sweet softie inside. It also reminds me of my younger brother and sister and the antics we would get up too.
Raising my head, I stretch my neck to get the stiffness out of my joints. After all, I have been here for a while now. As I am stretching my neck and arms out, my gaze falls on a ledge on the other side of The Valley. It is a nest made from sticks, sheltered under a large rock: this is Petrie's home. I would recognise it anywhere since I along with Littlefoot and Chomper helped Petrie move there after his old nest was destroyed by a landslide during The Days of Rising Waters. I can't quite see into the nest from this distance but I'll bet Petrie and his family are having berries for dinner, Petrie would be pleased - after all, they are his favourite food.
Favourite foods; I can't help but remember my last Star Day. My friends had gone out of the way to bring me my favourite food in a Giving Ceremony and although most of the sweet bubbles were crushed by the Earthshake, I can still remember the sweet taste of the few I did have. Looking down at The Valley I try to spy out my other remaining friends. My eye follows the river to one of the many waterfalls in on the side of the cliffs. It is here that I can spot my friends Ducky and Spike. Even though the whole family which is the largest in The Valley I think is present I still manage to spot Ducky because she is right next to Spike who is swallowing down mouth loads of tree stars down at once. I can't help but laugh at the sight of Spike eating a bit of Ducky's dinner while her back is turned.
Ducky's mother is easy to spot since she towers over all of her children; she was very kind to me earlier today when I asked for a talk with her. I didn't know who else to turn to, as I am so used to taking my own counsel or my family's but I have no answers for the problem I was presented with and her advice was really helpful. Ducky and Spike are lucky to have such a compassionate and thoughtful mother.
With a huff I push myself away from the edge of the cliff that I was sitting on. I suppose that's why I made this cliff my Thinking Place, because it reminds me of home and the view from Hanging Rock. I stand on my long strong legs and look down towards my left and see a large opening in the rock which I have walked through plenty of times before for it is the entrance to The Secret Caverns which has been Chomper's sleeping place as well as mine since we moved to The Great Valley. I can see him waiting just outside the cave. I may not be able to see his expression from here but I can tell simply by looking at his agitated stance that he is worried, probably because I haven't come back yet but after the events of today I don't really want to go back down there. Our relationship is more than just a simply friendship or a caregiver now and that has been a major headache for me today. For all this time I had looked after Chomper and I have found that he is such a sensitive boy even though he is a Sharptooth, but I have looked out for him almost as if I was playing the double role of friend and mother. His announcement might have not been so bad if I only 'he' hadn't have shown up.
My gaze falls down to another clearing a short distance from The Secret Caverns and there is only one dinosaur present there and he is not what most people would expect to see here in The Great Valley, the land of plant eaters, because like me, he is a Fast Runner. He is a bright purple Fast Runner and an old friend of mine that I haven't seen since my earlier childhood years. His name is Cayne and he and Chomper are the source of all my troubles on this fine spring day.
I turn back on The Valley as twilight falls and the land is shrouded in darkness. I make my way into the cave behind me. I was once trapped in here on my Star day but ever since my friends pushed the boulder out of the way and then later going through the lengths to push it off the cliff entirely I have been able to access it easily. I lie down on the ground and put my head on the ground, I will be sleeping here for the foreseeable future since I have no desire to go down to The Secret Caverns or outside. Even though Chomper is worried, I am sure that he knows I would never do anything dangerous or foolish without a good reason and that is not what I have now. I feel almost selfish about my actions here but I can't stay near Chomper tonight. Too much has happened and I need time to take it all in and reflect on the day I have just been through. Still it would be courteous to tell him that I won't be sleeping down in The Caverns with him tonight, maybe the night air might even calm my hyperactive mind.
I get up from my prone position and slowly walk out into the night. Looking up at the sky I see a beautiful Night Circle at its fullest and all the lesser lights shining brightly. I remember Mr Thicknose said that if you look closely enough at the right places you'll see the outlines of different dinosaurs in the sky; these places are The Great Beyond for each of the different dinosaur kinds. I haven't seen any Fast Runner shape up there but I'm sure that I'll find it up there one day after all there are so many of these lights that there couldn't be one that is not shaped like a Fast Runner. Besides if there wasn't, then we Fast Runners would have no Great Beyond to go to when we pass away.
In the meantime I contemplate what will happen when I inevitably meet Chomper. I know that there is a choice that I must make soon, a very important one, but I don't know what to do and my feelings on the matter are such jumble that I don't know what they mean. How am I going to make the best of this particular situation when I have no idea what to do? My heart and feelings are jumbled but my head has a commitment and a course but until I hear what my heart is saying then I can't decide or I would be heartless.
As I walk slowly down the path from my Thinking Place and down towards The Secret Caverns, my mind plays over the events of the day and at first it amazes me how normal the day started out before it became an abnormal, ridiculous and heart dividing day, as I suppose if I wanted to properly analyse what happened today then I must start at the beginning. Suddenly I start wishing that I hadn't left my thinking place as my mind starts processing today's happenings from the moment I woke up…..