To see if he was correct or not, Kosh stood up from his nest and took a few steps closer to the odd creature. When he got a good look at the creature, he was able to discern the creature's features better.

The creature's skin was cream-colored on his arms and face, but grey in his torso, brown on his legs, and black on his feet. Of course, like a human, the creature's skin was baggy on a good portion of his body, but judging from the way that the creature was shorter, it was possibly far younger than Charles ever was. However, there were some other, stranger features as well.

There was an odd brown lump on the creature's back, with what seemed to be some sort of stick coming out of it. There was also a small black object on the creature's left hip, and then there was what seemed to be a curved stick with a vine attached to it that was around the creature's shoulder.

But then Kosh noticed that the creature was still breathing, so to help it wake up, he nudged it slightly a few times with his nose. Sure enough, the creature soon winced and groaned as it looked like it was starting to wake up. Kosh didn't want the creature to wake up with his nose in its face, so he carefully and quietly took a few steps back.


"Hey, kid, are you okay?"

Still dazed and confused by what just happened, Tormod heard what sounded like the voice of a middle-aged man.

"Oui...I...think so." Tormod blindly answered as he tried to open his eyes.

Disoriented from the stone taking him somewhere, as he got up to his knees, Tormod looked to his left, and he strained his eyes, only barely making out a pinkish-red shape. He shook his head slightly, and his vision finally became clear. What he saw made his eyes widen in surprise, although he initially managed to keep himself from jumping out of his skin.

Right there, in front of his eyes, was a DINOSAUR, an Ankylosaurus, to be exact, and what the odd pinkish-red shape turned out to be, as the dinosaur had that same color.

But then, something happened that not even in his dreams did Tormod expect.

"Are you sure you're okay, kid?" the dinosaur asked in the same middle-aged voice.

At this, Tormod only had one reaction.

"SACRE BLEU!"

Tormod jumped to his feet and stumbled back a few feet, almost falling over. Out of surprise and shock, he gripped the sides of his head and went into a french rant.

"Qu'est-ce que le foutre se passe?! D'abord, la pierre du temps m'emmene quelque part sans que j'essaye meme! Ensuite, je rencontre un dinosaure, de toutes choses, quelque chose que je ne savais pas que je ferais por de vrai! Et maintenant le dinosaure parle! Qu'est-ce que l'enfer a tort avec moi?!"


Startling the creature into a rant like that was something that Kosh didn't want to do. All he wanted to do was help, but perhaps this creature was shocked by the fact that he could talk. This, however, proved something that Kosh had been suspecting.

This creature was a human.

Back when Charles was still around, he explained to a still-young Kosh that humans were the only ones of their world who could really talk like flatteeth could, and it was in various different languages, as he called them. So because of that, it was very shocking to them whenever they met another creature, like a flattooth, who could talk. And since this reaction greatly deviated from that of other dinosaurs, who saw it as a literal everyday thing, this was a great way to figure out if this creature was a human.

Right now, though, he had to get the human, who was ranting in a foreign language, which he could tell was French because of being raised by Charles, who was a French speaker, to stop freaking out.

"Hey, slow down." Kosh told the human, getting his attention. "Panicking isn't gonna help."

At that, the human stopped ranting and looked at him. Kosh could tell that the human looked nervous.

"Look, I know that this is pretty confusing for you right now," Kosh began, "but just let me ask you this. What's your name? Do you have one?"

The human hesitated for a bit before responding.

"Oui...my name's Tormod." the human responded. "And...yours?"

"Mine's Kosh." Kosh introduced himself. "Nice to meet you, young human."

"You too-" Tormod replied in kind, until he seemed to realize what Kosh just called him. "Wait, what? How did know I was a human?"

"Well, it's a long story." Kosh told him. "But if you want me to try and explain it to you, I am happy to do that. Want me to explain?"

Tormod nodded.

"Alright then, come here and let me tell you, but just to let you know, this is gonna be long." Kosh warned.

Tormod apparently thought that "come here" meant "come here and sit in my lap", for when Kosh sat back down in his nest to tell Tormod his story of how he knew about humans, Tormod walked over to him and sat in his lap. That wasn't what Kosh meant, but oh well.

Either way, though, Kosh then took a deep breath and began telling his story. "It all began 60 cold times ago, or 60 years ago, as you humans probably call it. Anyways, at that time, I was only 5, and I wasn't having the best time of my life, since at the time, I had just lost my entire family to a pretty bad sickness. as you would expect, I cried a lot, because I missed my family so much, and because of that, some of the other kids used to bully me and call me a crybaby."

Tormod seemed visibly upset at hearing this, though he didn't say anything, as if waiting for Kosh to say something else. So Kosh went on with his story.

"But then, something amazing happened." Kosh continued with a slightly upbeat tone. "In a bright flash of light, a human ended up right in front of me. When he woke up, and when I let him come near me, he told me that his name was "Charles", and he explained some stuff about himself, and that he came here because of something called a "time stone" that hung around his neck. When I told him what had happened to my family, Charles felt sorry for me, and because of that, and wanting to help me, he adopted me as his son. Now, because he came from another world, which must be where you humans live, Charles had to travel between his world and this one. But even then, Charles did his best to raise me in that manner, teaching me the stuff I needed to know, like how to get my own food, how to give myself a bath, and how to use this clubbed tail to protect myself, the last one being why I'm often called "Mr. Clubtail". And for 15...years, from the time he found me to the time that I became a grown-up, Charles raised me, and he was pretty much my father."

Tormod looked pleased by the fact that this "Charles" guy did such a good job raising Kosh to adulthood. But then, Kosh's story took a less pleasant tone.

"That, though, was when it happened." Kosh began wrapping up his story with a more downbeat tone. "One day, when I was 20...years old, and when I had become a grownup, Charles left, and he never came back. At first, I didn't know that he was never going to come back after that time, since he had been coming to, and going from, my world for so long. But then, I found that I was waiting a really long time, and eventually, I finally realized that he was gone, and it hurt bad, really bad, because he was the guy who I eventually came to know as my father and my best friend, and he's also the reason why I'm still alive today. Now, I'm 65, and I still wish that I could see him again for just once."


Tormod was quite surprised and touched by how much of a mood whiplash there was in Kosh's story. The elder dinosaur had much more depth to him that one would expect him to have. And he certainly didn't exactly have the happiest life, either.

"Mon dieu, that was definitely not the easiest way of growing up." Tormod remarked. "At least the story is to the point about why you know about humans."

"Well, glad you understand." Kosh replied. Then, he decided to ask the young human what he wanted to do. "So, what do you want to do now, Tormod?"

"I...don't know." Tormod bluntly admitted. "Honestly, this whole "being with the dinosaurs" thing is very hard for me to take in."

"If that's the case, then you could come with me." Kosh offered. "I may usually do my stuff in the morning by myself most of the time, but I don't mind you tagging along."

"Alright, I guess I'll go with that." Tormod accepted. "Maybe that will help me get this whole thing through my head."

Then, as Tormod and Kosh got up, the elder dinosaur looked at the young human male. It was clear to Tormod that Kosh had another offer.

"And it's not like you have to walk the whole time." Kosh told him. "I already know that humans get tired faster than dinosaurs do, and I learned that from growing up with Charles. He always had poor stamina, so to get around that problem, he would ride me, since even when he had just found me when I was only 5, I was way bigger and stronger, and I didn't get tired as fast, so even then, I could easily carry him. If you want to, you can ride on my back too."

Tormod nodded, at this offer, accepting it. At this, Kosh lowered his decently-sized head to allow Tormod to get on. Once he was on the large Ankylosaurus, Tormod settled down in-between the spikes on Kosh's back, which were widely spaced apart, so he had a lot of stretching room.

"Are you ready, Tormod?" Kosh asked once Tormod was on his back.

"Ready."

"Alright then, here we go." Kosh said, and with that, he began moving.

Tormod couldn't believe that he was riding a dinosaur, and he found it rather thrilling, though initially, he found it harder to ride a dinosaur than he thought, but once he steadied himself, the ride was smooth.

Once he was steady, Tormod decided to relax a bit on Kosh's back. Even though he was usually brave and calm, and didn't need to relax as often as others, this was a completely different situation, because he was in a very different world, where he knew that things worked differently.

Today was going to be long, so he needed to try taking it easy if he could.